


Perfect Match (if you squint a bit)

by elephantfootprints



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Arranged Marriage, First Kiss, First Time, Forced Marriage, Government Matchmaking Program, M/M, Resolved Sexual Tension
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-09-29
Updated: 2013-09-29
Packaged: 2017-12-27 23:15:21
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 18
Words: 30,104
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/984795
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/elephantfootprints/pseuds/elephantfootprints
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><em>"Look at us! I'm straight, you keep severed heads in the fridge, it's hardly a match made in heaven."</em><br/>From the <a href="http://sherlockbbc-fic.livejournal.com/21697.html?thread=128169921#t128169921">prompt</a>: "In a world where people report being generally unsatisfied with their romantic lives and divorces are at an all time high, the quality of relationships are plummeting. Healthy relationships lead to happy citizens, which ultimately help form a better society and country. So, the British government has decided to take matters into hand by setting up a program to match a person with their best possible romantic partner."</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> Originally posted [here](http://sherlockbbc-fic.livejournal.com/21697.html?thread=128244929#t128244929).
> 
> Beta/brit-picked by the amazing [Theresholesinthesky](http://theresholesinthesky.tumblr.com/).

Marriage, it seemed, was a dying institution. A failing institution. With the rise of secularism and the fall of old-fashioned value on purity; the widespread accessibility of birth control and the decriminalisation of homosexual acts; the introduction of no-fault divorce and the ease with which drunken lovers and friends and strangers could get married, well, it was no wonder marriage was on the outs. But it wasn’t marriage as a concept that was the problem, all the studies proved that. Theoretically, marriage ought to not simply provide a structure for raising a family, but also a support structure for adults, it should lower the suicide rates, stabilise the economy and the job market, the overall health of the population should increase, life-expectancies raised while simultaneously decreasing the number of aged persons requiring external care. A strong marriage should result in happier, healthier, more prosperous and useful citizens. It was not the idea of marriage that was failing, but the quality when left in the hands of the ignorant masses.

The British government had been aware of the problems surrounding marriage for a long time. It was hoped that cheap or free access to birth control would help as the number of marriages to save bastard children decreased. It didn’t help. Then it was argued that poor marriages were as damaging to society as quality marriages were beneficial, and so divorce became more affordable and accessible. It didn’t help. And then one day, early in the morning, after endless fruitless discussions about how marriage shouldn’t be ruining the country, marriage should be the cornerstone allowing it them to grow and flourish, someone had a thought. Medical advances and scientific discoveries and the growing acceptance that people were all different and that different didn’t have to mean bad, it should have all added up to a terribly progressive and efficient and lovely world to be living in. It was utterly absurd that all these wonderful elements could do bugger all as long as the plight of moronic marriages was allowed to continue. If only people thought for a second before they got married! 

This thought was allowed to fester and grow. Rants about people not really knowing who makes a good spouse turned into venting about people going into marriage totally unaware of just how incompatible they really were and suddenly there were declarations that if so-and-so were in charge of who married who they’d never be in the mess they were in now. 

The proposal that the government should be in charge of telling people who they ought to marry would never go over well. People instinctively protested governmental interference. If the government were to take control of marriage, it had to be subtle, with excellent marketing and minimal overt intrusion.

To start with, marriage as a concept needed to become popular once more. The definition grew so it wasn’t just about babies or religion. Same-sex marriage was to be treated precisely the same was as opposite-sex marriage. The emphasis was on companionship, stability and help.

Then, the government came up with a new initiative: Matching. With proper access to knowledge about people’s habits, passions, hobbies, needs and desires when combined with factors like age, location, income and education it was possible for algorithms to fairly accurately determine the likely success of a couple’s relationship. A department would be established to assist couples seeking marriage to optimise their chances of future bliss, and it would also advise single citizens on people with whom they demonstrated significant compatibility. It was of course, entirely up to them what they did with this information. The government was just giving a helping hand.

Behind the scenes, changes would be brought in slowly, gradually, working up to the ideal balance of government interference and citizen stupidity, but it could work.

They started by making it harder to get married. There was more paperwork, personality tests, mandatory waiting periods and counselling. People understood that. Marriage, they had been made to realise, was quite a serious business. The minimum age to get married was officially raised to 22 and divorce was unofficially harder to get after 50. To save time and effort and money and all the things the government ought to be saving, it was agreed that everyone should just do the bureaucratic side of things, the paperwork (mostly just questionnaires and surveys, nothing to worry about) at 21 and then they would just have to update them before they got married. 

So carefully and slowly were these changes brought in that before people realised it, there was legislation in place that meant if you wanted to have a proper say in who you married you really had to get married before you were 30, and even then it was trial by paperwork and patience. After 30 the matter of whether you were Matched or unMatched was much more serious. Not impossible to work around, mind you, but it certainly made things more complicated. And if, heaven forbid, by the time you were around 40 you were still unmarried, well, that just wouldn’t do, now would it? The government had been generously sending you notifications of people with whom you displayed remarkable compatibility on a regular basis for the past 20 odd years, after all. It had been proven, scientifically, psychologically, economically, historically, bad for everyone if the majority of the population wasn’t happily married. At this point, the government pulled out all the stops and found your Perfect Match. A Match of such compatibility you’d be an idiot not to get married. A really big idiot. Criminally idiotic, one could say. Most people married their Perfect Match. 

The Perfect Match scheme did come dangerously close to crossing a line of interference that people would not withstand, so it was kept in largely in reserve. Fortunately, the Matching scheme was so successful, most people were married well before 40, and the social stigma that came from being unmarried made the whole process quite smooth. And those still unhappy with the scheme? Too few to worry about.

This Orwellian approach to marriage should have resulted in uproar and protest and possibly even a revolution or two, but the illusion of freedom of choice was maintained. People were happy. The Matching process worked. Not all the time, of course, and to varying degrees, but on the whole it worked. Marriage was saved. Great Britain was saved.


	2. Part 1

Despite the rather nippy breeze and the ungodliness of the hour, John Watson found himself pleased to be standing in an abandoned building considering a corpse and sipping piping hot coffee. Oh. Perhaps that should have been despite the dead body, potential structural instability of where he was standing, nippy breeze and blasphemous time of night, John Watson found himself pleased to be awake, sipping truly scalding coffee and watching his mad flatmate stalk around in his coat, not looking quite cool, but not a total prat either.

Sherlock, of course, was utterly oblivious to such dull matters as the time or the weather. He streaked around the room, coat billowing, inspecting, muttering deductions to himself as Lestrade filled John in.

“Neighbours reported a light at 11 pm yesterday evening. Given the state of the building and the time of night it was suspicious enough to report it,” Lestrade said. He took a sip of his own coffee and groaned with pleasure. “The body was found by our officers and identified as Louise Smith, 27, teacher at the local school. No criminal record. She was last seen alive by her husband at 4pm when she apparently went to the shops and didn’t return. Surveillance indicates she did not arrive at the shops. Time of death appears to be 4:45pm and cause of death asphyxiation, probably due to the ingestion of a toxin.”

John glanced over the woman’s prone body. “I concur. Does the husband have an alibi?”

“They’re Matched,” Anderson interjected. Sherlock stopped still, radiating frustration.

“Yes, thank you for that insight, heaven knows I might have been rendered blind and stupid and somehow missed that pertinent detail, thank god you were on hand to assist me,” Sherlock said. Then he paused, cocked his head and sneered. “Oh, and of course I haven’t yet had my daily dose of government propaganda espousing the virtues of a Matched marriage. Still, I might be forgiven for overlooking the fact that a Matched husband is utterly incapable of wronging his wife as I, unlike you, do not have the first hand knowledge of such perfect wedded bliss. Speaking of, how is Sally enjoying your wife’s visit to her sister?”

Anderson spluttered.

“No, wait, I don’t care. Leave, now,” Sherlock said. He gestured imperiously to the door and though Lestrade shot Anderson a sympathetic glance, he also moved out of the doorway and didn’t reprimand Sherlock. Anderson frowned, deeply offended, but shuffled out, knowing it was pointless to protest.

“Any ideas?” Lestrade asked.

“No need for ideas, I’ve solved it,” Sherlock said. “Arrest the husband, of course. Only possible solution.”

“The husband?” Lestrade confirmed. “You’d better have watertight proof, it’s much harder to get a conviction in cases of Matched marriage homicide.”

“Surely the Matched kill each other the same as anyone,” John said. “I mean, if the number of STDs I’ve had to treat are any indication, they aren’t any less likely to cheat on each other, why would they be less likely to kill each other?”

“There is a higher number of murders involving Matched couples, but the majority of marriages these days are Matched, so that’s hardly surprising,” Sherlock said. “I personally have investigated more Matched murders, but that’s generally because, as we have just witnessed, the utter incompetents in charge forget that even Matched marriages can have problems. In terms of proportions, records show unMatched couples have a disproportionately large number of domestic violence cases reported.”

“Right, but how much of that is because they’re ostracised?” John interjected, thinking of his sister, Harry, driven to drink because her unMatched, but exceedingly beautiful and talented, wife, Clara, was passed over for job after job after job in favour of Matched or even single nannies. Wives were convinced the unMatched couldn’t be trusted to not seduce husbands and Harry endured constant, usually less than subtle, hints that she was not putting effort into her work because all her energies were being drained by her higher maintenance relationship. 

“And how much because the officials prefer the records to reflect that Matched marriages are vastly superior?” Sherlock said with a shrug. “Isn’t it ironic that you’re probably safer in an unMatched marriage? Everyone’s much faster to respond and raise enough of a fuss to resolve the situation. Matched domestic violence is swept under the rug.”

“Hey!” Lestrade protested. “That’s not fair. We do our jobs, we protect everyone equally. The higher ups might try and spin the numbers, but not us. Not at our level. Now, why would Richard Smith kill his wife? By all accounts they were happy, healthy and starting a life together. No reports of arguments, showing high marks in their reviews and the counsellor’s reports were positive.”

“Money,” Sherlock said shortly. “Louise had some sort of life insurance or trust fund or some such that Richard thought he’d use to pay off his enormous gambling debts. Killing Louise was made easier by the fact that they were still virtual strangers. Check his bank records, he might have had this in mind from the moment he was notified of his match with Louise. You can do all the maths in the world; marrying a stranger has certain risks beyond potentially incompatible tastes in television. The real question is why did you pull me onto the scene so quickly?” Sherlock asked, stopping still a few feet in front of Lestrade and looking at him piercingly. “You’ve had no time to run out of theories, even if you had only come up with the most basic, moronic ideas... Oh god, Mycroft put you up to this, didn’t he?”

Sherlock turned to John. He glanced over his flatmate, taking in details unnoticed by and meaningless to others.

“Don’t look at me, I didn’t talk to your git brother about your nine day sulk.” John said.

“No,” Sherlock agreed. “But you did complain to Sarah about it.”

“And you think she’s working for your brother?” John said dubiously.

“Hardly,” Sherlock scoffed. “But Mycroft’s obviously bugged the clinic again.”

John groaned. 

“Your brother did not put me up to this, I have no idea what you are talking about,” Lestrade said. Sherlock rolled his eyes.

“Of course not.” Sherlock said. He gave a huff of annoyance and swept out of the room, with an imperious, “Come, John.”

John shook his head, torn between exasperation and fondness. “As one man being ordered around by a Holmes brother to another, next time could you wait until I’ve at least had a chance to get some sleep before you call us in?”

“Sherlock keeping you up?” Lestrade said, with a roughish wink.

John snorted. “Yeah, right. I was scrubbing exploded pig intestines from the ceiling. Between the experiments and the violin playing, Sherlock prevents me from getting a lot of sleep.”

Lestrade gave a good natured laugh. “I’ll keep that in mind next time. You alright to come in tomorrow to do the paperwork?”

John nodded and jogged out of the room to catch up with Sherlock, pleased to find the detective texting furiously on the street and not halfway home already.

“I’m not doing the paperwork for this,” Sherlock said without looking up. “Even an idiot could piece this one together; getting me to do paperwork would be sheer laziness on their part and utterly tedious.”

A taxi pulled up and they hopped in. “54 Ritherdon Road, Tooting Bec,” John said. “Sherlock, you know you have to sign things if you are on the scene. Much as they might need your help, they do have to follow some legalities.”

“Fine,” Sherlock said shortly. “Have someone courier them over. I think we’re going to have to introduce a new rule that I don’t leave the house for anything less interesting than a seven.” 

John rolled his eyes and they fell into a companionable silence. 

As they headed inside, John grabbed the pile of post from the small table in the foyer, flipping idly through the bills, unsurprised to find a pale green envelope addressed to him. The Matching notices had been coming more frequently since his 35th birthday, and it wasn’t unusual for him to receive them as often as monthly. He dumped the envelopes on the mantelpiece and headed upstairs to get ready for bed, absently wishing Sherlock a good night.

The next morning, feeling surprisingly refreshed for such a short sleep, John hummed cheerfully to himself as he made tea and toast. Sherlock was lying on the couch in full thinking mode so John steeled himself to tackle the bills and work out just how dire the finances were.

Nearly an hour later, John was feeling rather calm and content. They had enough money for rent and food even after all the bills were covered, and a little extra to squirrel away for the next time Sherlock exploded something expensive or all the well-paying cases were declared boring. Such was his good mood that John could even look at the green Matching envelope with wry amusement. His face fell quickly.

“Sherlock, you need to see this,” John said.

“Not now, I’m busy,” Sherlock said without opening his eyes. “If we can’t afford the bill, forward it to Mycroft. Or burn it. Or agonise over it quietly.”

“It’s not a bill,” John said. He crossed over to the couch and pushed the letter into Sherlock’s face, shaking it until Sherlock unsteepled his hands to snatch it away from John. He opened his eyes and read the letter quickly.

‘Dear Doctor John Watson,

We are delighted to inform you that our system has found for you a Perfect Match! In all areas you and SHERLOCK HOLMES have been found to be ideally suited. We strongly recommend that you contact Mr Holmes and together begin the application for marriage. To help you in this endeavour, we have enclosed an itinerary optimised for your future marital bliss.

If you have any questions, comments or concerns, please don’t hesitate to contact us.

Yours sincerely,

Natasha Matthews,

Department of Matching’


	3. Part 2

“Mycroft,” Sherlock spat bitterly, thrusting the letter back at John. He stood up and started stalking around the room, blue dressing gown flaring out behind him.

“What?” John said, bemused. Sherlock stopped and whirled to look at him.

“This is obviously his doing, the interfering sod,” Sherlock said. John raised an eyebrow and Sherlock scoffed. “You don’t actually think we’re Perfectly Matched?”

John laughed in surprise. “Oh, god no.”

“No, precisely. Mycroft has obviously decided that I can no longer afford to go around unmarried and has engineered this... this Matching,” Sherlock said. He ran his hands through his hair. 

“You really think Mycroft can interfere with Matching?” John asked dubiously. Sherlock shot him a filthy look.

“Of course he can,” Sherlock muttered. He snatched his phone from the coffee table and started texting furiously. John frowned. 

“Look, let’s just say Mycroft was behind this,” John said.

“Which he almost certainly is,” Sherlock said. He glared at his phone.

“Right, well, if he is, there’s not much we can do about it, is there?” John said. “I mean, even suppose he did manage to flag us as a Perfect Match, even Mycroft can hardly stop it now.”

“Which he is not going to be interested in doing,” Sherlock said.

“Exactly,” John said. “But let’s face it, all that we have to deal with at the moment is an uncomfortable few weeks and then everything will go back to normal. There’s no way Mycroft could pull off rigging a marriage acceptance, and we’re hardly going to pass all the pre-marriage requirements. Look at us! I’m straight, you keep severed heads in the fridge, it’s hardly a match made in heaven.”

Sherlock let out a startled laugh and John quickly joined him.

 

John was aware that the process involved in the application for marriage was complicated and full of endless paperwork. Harry had mentioned some of the more ridiculous aspects, but Christ, he had no idea just how involved it all was. He had picked up the application package on his way to his afternoon shift at the clinic and in an unexpected lull decided to open it up and get an idea of what was jammed into the bulky package. And then spent 15 minutes staring at it. The stacks of paper, the books, the poster. 

“What’s all this, then?” Sarah asked jovially, entering John’s consultation room with a cup of coffee. She stopped dead at the sight. Her eyes took in the pale green sheets of paper, the words ‘you and your partner’, ‘Matched’ and ‘wedded bliss’ jumping out at her. 

John looked up at her, feeling oddly guilty. And not just for dealing with personal matters while he was at work. He groaned. “Application for marriage.”

“Oh,” Sarah said slowly. She had dated John, but it had never gotten serious enough for them to be tested for Matching. Marriage had never entered the picture, and she’d known, from the first time John had cancelled on her to run off with Sherlock that they were not meant to be. Sometimes she wished they’d been tested, the failed romance would have been far more palatable if she’d had a pale green slip of paper informing her they were unMatched. But then again, she’d always wondered if they would have been declared a Match. Maybe even pined a little for it. It wasn’t likely, or they’d have been told about it before. Similar enough ages, similar professions, both living in London, similar social class. When these variable factors matched up everyone knew the DoM would already have run their files to see if they were a Match. Even so, Sarah would never have wanted to marry someone always rushing off fighting Chinese mafia. She’d long since accepted this, but somehow, seeing John frown hopelessly over a marriage application package had brought something up. How much was simply the absurd belief that John would join the tiny ranks of the population that never married and how much was the assumption that she’d be married long before him, well, she wasn’t really sure.

“Yeah,” John said. “I got a Perfect Match notification.”

“Ohh,” Sarah said. Instantly she felt much better. John was a few years older than her and clearly someone had decided he had been on the shelf too long. Sarah wasn’t particularly cynical about Matching, but everyone knew that a Perfect Match found after you were 35 was clearly more of a high-probability Match and reminder that you weren’t getting any younger, than a soul mates thing. It was maths, not poetry. “Who with? Do you know them already?”

“Sherlock,” John said. Sarah stared at him, but John kept his eyes firmly fixed on the desk. Sarah let out a slightly strangled laugh.

“Of course it is,” she said bitterly. John looked up at her, surprised.

“Sarah?” John said hesitantly. Sarah had been hurt, but their break-up had ultimately been amicable (which was more than he could say for some of the others since) and they’d become quite good, well, if not friends, then at least friendly colleagues.

“No, no, I know,” Sarah said, taking a few deep breaths. “It’s just... Well, of course it’s him? Who did you always cancel on me for? Who kept popping up on our dates? Who still makes you late for work, or makes you leave early, or makes you not show up at all? And now you’re getting married. Explains a bit, doesn’t it?”

“Christ, no,” John said. “We’re not actually going to get married.”

“But you got a Perfect Match notification,” Sarah said. “That’s as good as married, isn’t it?”

“Most of the time,” John allowed. “But there’s no way we’re going to pass all this application business. We’re just mates, I’m not even gay and he’s categorically unsuited to marriage, they’ll pick up on that.”

“Mm,” Sarah hummed dubiously. “If you say so. When does all this have to be in by?”

“According to the itinerary they’ve sent, the forms have to be in within the week, then it’s all counselling and exercises and recommended reading for a few weeks. Then, when our marriage guide thinks we’re ready, we have to sit an exam,” John said.

Sarah let out a laugh. “An exam? Seriously?”

“Yeah,” John said, smiling at her with wry amusement. “According to Harry it’s all favourite ice-cream and best sex positions, but I think I’ll take that with a pinch of salt. I’m not too worried, we’re not exactly hoping to pass.”

“That would take the pressure off,” Sarah agreed. “Normally at this point I’d be handing out the numbers for hotlines and telling people about discussion boards, but I don’t know what to do if someone wants to fail.”

“If my memory of university exams serves, a good dose of strong alcohol the night before usually does the trick,” John said. Sarah laughed.

“You will take it seriously though, won’t you?” Sarah said. “Not try and sabotage yourselves? We’ve all heard the rumours of what happens to people who mess with Matching. At the very least you’d lose your licence.”

“I know,” John said ruefully. “But it’ll be fine. Being honest is probably our best bet for rejection, anyway.”

“If you say so,” Sarah said, smiling. “I’ll leave you to it.”

 

In the end John had just stared at the pile before stuffing it back into the box and deciding to leave it for when he was home and had access to tea and the mad flatmate he was supposedly trying to marry. Not that John expected Sherlock to be any help, far from it, but it felt wrong doing it without him. After John left the clinic he was contemplating what take-away to have for dinner when he suddenly remembered his promise to Lestrade to get Sherlock to sign the paperwork. He groaned to himself, knowing it was too much to hope for that Sherlock had gone of his own will and aware that it really did stuff things up for Lestrade when it wasn’t done. And Lestrade had done a lot for them, letting them on crime scenes, turning a blind eye to John’s gun, not punching Sherlock. John straightened his shoulders and let go of his vision of getting home with take-away and collapsing in front of the television for the evening.

 

“Is that a marriage package?” Sally asked John as he approached Lestrade’s office.

Christ, why did everything from the DoM have to be green?

“Yeah, I got a Perfect Match notification,” John said with a sigh.

“Oh,” Sally said. “Who is it? Is it the freak?”

John hesitated. Sally swore softly, surprise and delight colouring her voice.

“No, really?” Sally said. “The freak? I thought he must have been declared unmarriable or something by now.”

“You can’t be declared unmarriable,” John said shortly. He continued towards Lestrade’s door and was surprised when Sally rushed over to him and grasped his arm.

“I know you trust him, and I know marriage is vital, but if you every need help or want to get out, you can come to me,” Sally said, speaking quietly but urgently. John looked at her, slightly shocked.

“Uh, thanks,” John said. Sally released him with a short nod.

 

“Is that a marriage package?” Lestrade asked as John entered his office. John groaned.

“Yeah, I got a Perfect Match notification,” John said. He sort of wished he’d put the damned thing in an opaque bag, but they’d have to find out sooner or later. You could hardly keep the process secret.

“Oh, right,” Lestrade said cautiously. “Anyone you know?”

“Sherlock,” John said shortly. “They’ve only gone and bloody assigned us as a Perfect Match. Sherlock’s convinced it’s Mycroft’s doing.”

“Right,” Lestrade said.

“I’m not too worried though, there’s no way we’re going to pas,” John said with a shrug.

“You two actually are sort of a perfect match.” John looked at him. “I mean, if you squint a bit.” John’s eyebrow raised. “Well, who else is able to put up with his condescending arse?” Lestrade said. Then he added softly. “And who else could give you the excitement you crave?”


	4. Part 3

The marriage application package was left sitting on their desk, slowly being buried under piles of notes and photos and diagrams as an exciting and complicated case took over their lives for the next four days. 

Sherlock and John burst into their flat, full of the excitement and adrenaline that came with a successfully solved case. Their laughter cut out abruptly when they spotted Mycroft, sitting in John’s armchair, holding the pale green box. John hadn’t forgotten it exactly, it had just sort of slipped to the back of his mind in all the exhilaration. Sherlock had undoubtedly deleted it.

“I see you two have been busy,” Mycroft said dryly. Sherlock shot his brother a withering look and stamped over to his violin case. John thought tea was in order.

“What do you want, Mycroft?” Sherlock said. He rosined his bow carefully, before yanking it across the strings with a screech. “I doubt climbing our stairs will help much with the three pounds you have put on. However does Anthea stand it?”

Myrcroft gave him a tight, almost sarcastic smile. “I suppose I ought to be asking you a similar question. How does John stand the mess, the experiments, the discordant violin playing? I won’t ask about the calls to solve crimes at three in the morning, I understand for the good doctor, it’s quite the perk.”

John glowered from the kitchen. He hated when Mycroft talked about him as though he wasn’t in earshot. The kettle boiled just then, so he made no comment and busied himself with the mugs and tea bags.

“John and I are not married. He’s here because he wants to be and can leave at any time,” Sherlock said, playing a few discordant notes for emphasis. 

“Ah, you’ve brought me neatly to the point of my visit, my dear brother,” Mycroft said. “I can’t help but notice you and the doctor have been remiss in adhering to the itinerary the Department of Marriage has so helpfully sent. The preliminary forms are due in two days and you’ve yet to select a marriage guide.”

Sherlock paused in his violin assault, relaxing his arm and dropping the bow to the side. “Come to see your little scheme goes to plan?” Sherlock sneered.

“Sherlock, as I have repeatedly told you, I had nothing to do with this,” Mycroft said with a put-upon sigh.

“Here,” John said, thrusting tea at Mycroft and putting a mug down next to Sherlock. He sat down in the lounge. “Why don’t you just assign us a guide and have Anthea fill out the forms? Save us a lot of time.”

“John,” Sherlock said sharply. “Do you really want him more involved than he really is?”

“No, that’s true,” John said. “How about you assign as a guide, fill out the paperwork, then we’ll swap to a different guide, and change all the answers on the questionnaires? Then Bob’s your Uncle and I won’t be your brother-in-law.”

Sherlock breathed out a slight laugh and Mycroft cocked an eyebrow at him. John missed both and sat looking pleased with himself. Mycroft turned to John.

“Doctor Watson, I’m sure I don’t need to tell you this, but it is very important you try to follow the itinerary, or things could get very serious very quickly,” Mycroft said, looking at John very carefully. John nodded.

“I know,” John said. Mycroft handed John the green box. “I’ll get some food down Sherlock’s throat and then we’ll get right on it.”

Mycroft held John’s eye for a beat and then nodded. “Very well, I’ll leave you to it.”

Sherlock resumed his discordant playing as Mycroft stood and left. Once he felt certain that Mycroft was out of earshot, he dropped his arms once more. His good mood, swallowed up by Mycroft’s visit, managed to reassert itself and he let out a low chuckle. John glanced at him in surprise.

“Is this your attempt to ‘feed me up’?” Sherlock asked by way of explanation. John looked at him in confusion before the conversation held long ago came to mind.

“But I’m not your girlfriend,” John said with a smile. “It’s girlfriends who feed people up.”

“And boyfriends?” Sherlock prompted.

“I think they spend their time trying not to strangle their mad flatmates,” John said. They managed to laugh together for a few moments before the green box suddenly seemed terribly visible and the amusement died quickly. “We’d better get started.”

The forms due by the end of the week were fairly straightforward, so John tackled them, leaving gaps for Sherlock to fill, while Sherlock started investigating the marriage guides with a vengeance.

“Oh, no, this one will never do,” Sherlock muttered after a short period of silence. “Their husband’s about to drop dead of a heart attack, they’ll be terribly distracted and we’ll have to be sympathetic.”

“What’s your mother’s maiden name?” John asked, ignoring the muttering.

“Vernet,” Sherlock said absently. “Why on earth would they think someone who owns six small dogs is capable of guiding people into a successful marriage?”

“Christ, I shudder to think why the DoM needs to know about our prostate health,” John said. “Have you been checked for cancer recently?”

“Six months ago, all clear,” Sherlock said. “Who, in their right minds, entrusts their future happiness to someone claiming their name is ‘Sunshine’?”

John gave an agreeable sigh of disbelief. Then he registered what Sherlock had been saying.

“Sherlock,” John said patiently. “You do realise it doesn’t matter if they’re no good. We’re not trying to have our application accepted.”

“Oh, right,” Sherlock said. He thought about it for a moment, then, with a wicked gleam in his eyes, turned back to the computer.

 

Somehow, once the forms had been submitted and a marriage guide selected (an older woman who’d managed to acquire a divorce at the shocking age of 65 after her husband was arrested in Florida, though he was later declared not guilty and allowed to go free), the whole situation suddenly seemed far more real to John. Now he needed to start worrying about how this was going to affect their lives.

“Sherlock,” John said tentatively one Friday evening, nine days since he had received the letter, and three days before they were due to start proceedings. 

“Yes, John?” Sherlock replied. He was sprawled over the lounge, dressing gown in disarray, hands pressed together as was his wont when thinking deeply about something. John had been sitting in his armchair, ostensibly reading one of the books included with the package, detailing the history of marriage and its importance in modern day Britain, but his mind was caught running through conversations he’d had with Harry when she was applying to marry Clara. It had snagged on one particular comment, which now filled him with dread:

“It’s hilarious, John,” Harry had said, eyes bright with amusement. “They want to know all about your favourite sexual positions, how often you need to have sex, if you’re a morning, noon or nighter.”

John had wrinkled his nose. “Seriously?”

“Yeah, and apparently if you’re too prudish about it all, they assign you a sex therapist!” Harry had fallen over laughing, gasping to catch her breath enough to inform John that, “At least Clara and I don’t have that problem!”

John fiddled with the page he had been about to turn before closing the book and turning to Sherlock.

“This... process, to get married I mean, I have a feeling it’s going to be fairly invasive,” John said.

“I imagine so,” Sherlock said. He didn’t open his eyes, and John had a feeling he wasn’t paying much attention to the conversation. “Marriage tends to be regarded as deeply personal.”

“Right, but, I just mean, it could put us in awkward situations,” John said. Sherlock hummed an absent assent. “And I’m just worried that it might affect our friendship. I don’t want this stupid application to ruin things. I want us to still be friends at the end.”

“Of course, John,” Sherlock said seriously, sitting up to look at John. “Your friendship is very important to me. I’ll not let this absurd governmental interference spoil anything.”

John breathed a sigh of relief. “Good. And you too, of course. Your friendship means a lot to me.”


	5. Part 4

On Monday, miracle of miracles, no emergencies, murders, exploding experiments, sisters having emotional breakdowns, kidnapping brothers, flatmates having enormous sulks or other such hinderances prevented John and Sherlock from arriving to meet their marriage guide on time. If anything, they were a few minutes early. When John commented on this fact, Sherlock frowned and muttered darkly, ‘Mycroft’ and ‘interfering git’ the only words John could make out.

Their guide, Mrs Hudson, had elected to have them meet her at her flat rather than an office as she preferred the personal touch and her hip sometimes played up, making it difficult for her to travel. On the phone she seemed sweet and accommodating, in a sort of grandmotherly fashion. 

As John paid the taxi driver and Sherlock walked excitedly up to the green door of 221, John felt strangely optimistic about the process. He mightn’t want to pass the application process, but that didn’t mean he wanted to be dragging a kicking and sulking Sherlock around or spent weeks with a guide they couldn’t stand. Not long after Sherlock knocked the door opened to reveal an older woman, neatly dressed and smiling brightly. 

“Ah, you two must be John and Sherlock,” the woman said. “I’m Mrs Hudson.”

“I’m John,” John said, shaking her hand. “And this is Sherlock.”

Sherlock flashed a shammed smile and walked passed her into the hallway. John was about to apologise, but Mrs Hudson seemed unbothered and walked them over to unlock flat A. Once inside Mrs Hudson stopped and looked at John and Sherlock.

“Oh, look at you two handsome lads,” Mrs Hudson said, sounding pleased. “Mrs Turner’s going to be so jealous. She’s never guided a Perfect Match, and your scores, dears, terribly exciting stuff.”

“Mrs Hudson,” John started to say, but Mrs Hudson ushered them into her living room and continued to chatter.

“Not to worry, I know on your file it says you need the full process, nothing skipped, nothing rushed, full training,” Mrs Hudson said. “But I can tell, just by looking at you two that this will be just lovely. How long have you two been lovers?”

“Right, no,” John stammered. He glanced helplessly at Sherlock, but Sherlock was looking around the room intently. “We’re not, we’re just flatmates.”

“Oh, not to worry, dears,” Mrs Hudson said cheerfully. “I mean, it’s a bit naughty, the length of time you’ve lived together without applying, but it’s not exactly a crime, and I’m certainly not going to report you. Besides, you’re applying now, so it’s all fine in the end, that’s what’s important.”

“Look, thanks for the... support, but we’re really, really not lovers,” John said firmly.

“No?” Mrs Hudson asked, sounding disappointed. She looked over at Sherlock.

“No, heavens,” Sherlock said absently. “In fact, we’d rather like to fail this whole application. More importantly, were the police aware of your husband’s gambling problems, alcoholism and abusive tendencies?”

“Sherlock,” John said warningly. It wasn’t needed though, as, strangely, Mrs Hudson looked more rueful than offended or concerned by Sherlock’s question.

“Just the gambling,” Mrs Hudson said. “The others are much harder to prove; easier to cover up or deny.”

Sherlock nodded. “And his crime?”

“Murder,” Mrs Hudson said, her voice hard. Her earlier softness, her maternal tendencies all seemed to melt away and John realised that this woman had a core of steel. 

“Excellent!” Sherlock said, rubbing his hands together. “This whole process might not be a waste of time after all.”

“I can’t just fail you. Not even if you get him convicted,” Mrs Hudson said, apologetic but firm. “It has to all be by the book.”

“Yes, yes,” Sherlock waved his hand dismissively. 

“And I won’t put up with crime solving when we’re supposed to be working towards your marriage,” Mrs Hudson said. Sherlock pouted, but Mrs Hudson stared sternly at him, unmoved, so he finally collapsed on to her sofa.

“Fine,”

John looked at Mrs Hudson in surprise, feeling a new found wave of respect for her come over him.

“Take a seat, dear,” Mrs Hudson said. “I’ll make us some tea and we can get started.” And just like that she was back to being sweet and maternal, bustling off to her kitchen.

“Of course you managed to find us the marriage guide in need of a detective,” John said, half amused, half exasperated.

“I see no reason why this entire process needs to be tedious,” Sherlock said with a sniff. John laughed and Sherlock grinned at him. It always warmed John to see Sherlock smiling like that, so open and full of glee, knowing that few people ever got to see him like that, and fewer still could bring it out of him. Now though, the curl of warmth in his belly made him feel a little ill. People assuming he was romantically involved with Sherlock was nothing new, much as it still annoyed him, but now- now the government was convinced they needed to get married and that was a little harder to shake off. Usually when the assumptions got to him, John would take a long hard look at himself and try and work out what it was other people saw, before dismissing it. Telling himself it was just that he was one of the few people who could stand Sherlock. Who could see past the cold sarcastic exterior and get to know the warm and vibrant and amazing man underneath. 

But now John found himself looking at Sherlock. Really looking at him. Considering his black curls and bowed lips, his long lean figure and sharp grey-blue eyes. Wondering what it would be like to sit and drink him in until all the features were etched permanently in his mind. To lean over and brush those sharp cheekbones, rake his fingers through those inky locks. John tried and failed to imagine pressing his lips against Sherlock’s mouth. He found the man fascinating, but there was no spike of lust. Just warmth and deep fondness, a feeling of wonder, excitement and a strong sense of home.

Sherlock frowned at John, who was suddenly aware he’d been staring at Sherlock in silence for far too long. He swallowed and reflexively licked his lips. Sherlock’s eyes widened fractionally and John looked away, relieved when he spotted Mrs Hudson coming back into the room with a tray.

“Now, dears, usually guides just act as intermediaries between the counsellors and therapists and so forth,” Mrs Hudson said, setting the tea things down on the coffee table. “But apparently your case is a priority one, so they’ve taken all my other couples away, leaving my calendar wide open if you boys would prefer to do it all through me, and just have it verified at the end.”

“Obviously we don’t want to talk to other people,” Sherlock said. “None of them have spouses that have committed crimes. I checked.”

“We would appreciate that,” John confirmed.

“Lovely, so we can get right down to business.” Mrs Hudson said. “Firstly, I know nothing about you wanting to fail this application, because then I would have to report you, so thank goodness you didn’t mention anything.”

John gave a small laugh. “Thank goodness.”

Mrs Hudson smiled at him. “Right, we’re on a fairly tight schedule, so I expect you boys to pay attention and complete any homework I set.”

Sherlock opened his mouth to protest and Mrs Hudson shook a finger at him. “And no buts, if you don’t cooperate in this application, I won’t cooperate in your murder investigation.” Sherlock shut his mouth with a frown and John found himself sitting up straighter. 

“Today, we’re just going to look over which areas you need to focus on,” Mrs Hudson said. She finished pouring the tea and then pulled out a folder. “I have here a series of questions to start us off and work out what needs to be dealt with, and which things are fine. I won’t be pressing on problem areas, and I don’t want you to go home and have arguments. If you feel something needs to be addressed, write it down and bring it back next time and we’ll deal with it then, okay?”

“Sure,” John said.

“Get on with it,” Sherlock said, already sounding bored. 

“We’ll start with Communication skills. How would you rate yourself and your partner in matters of communication?” Mrs Hudson read.

John snorted slightly. “I would say Sherlock is very clear and direct, and can sometimes come across a bit abrasive.”

Sherlock rolled his eyes. “John favours the more useless dally-around-the-point approach, but he can be quite useful in smoothing over ruffled feathers or crying suspects.”

“How about when it comes to communication about your emotions?” Mrs Hudson said.

There was an awkward silence. “We do okay,” John said, finally. 

“Would you say you argue a lot? How do you resolve arguments?” Mrs Hudson said.

John smiled. “All the bloody time. Sometimes I go for a walk, or make tea, and then Sherlock manages to apologise and insult me at the same time.”

“That’s not it at all,” Sherlock protested. “Sometimes John is more of an idiot than usual, but I can usually get him to understand and forgive him.”

“Are you affectionate with one another, both physically and verbally? Are you happy with the current levels of affection?” Mrs Hudson asked.

“Um, I suppose?” John said. 

“John is more comfortable with my invading his personal space than others,” Sherlock said. “It’s... nice.”

Mrs Hudson smiled fondly at him. “You said you’re not currently sexually involved, but have you discussed your sexual needs?”

John spluttered and said firmly, “Just put not applicable.”

Mrs Hudson hesitated but then nodded and put a star next to the question. Sherlock looked deeply uncomfortable, but relaxed when she didn’t pursue the matter.

“You already live together, are you happy with your current living arrangements?”

“We’d like to live more centrally, but can’t really afford it," John said. “Otherwise all fine.”

Mrs Hudson looked thoughtful. “Do you find your schedules, in terms of work, sleeping habits, leisure and meal times, suit you both?”

“He needs to sleep and eat more, and sometimes he’ll play the violin all through the night and I can’t tell you the number of times I’ve been dragged out of bed for a case,” John said. He glanced at Sherlock. “But I don’t know that I would cope if it was any different.”

“John leaves the house far too often, but I don’t always notice, so it’s not a problem,” Sherlock said. “Or it wouldn’t be if he didn’t complain about missing things when he was gone.” John smiled wryly, but didn’t comment.

“How so you divide up chores such as cooking and cleaning?” Mrs Hudson asked.

John burst out laughing. Sherlock looked affronted. “John is the one who insists on such matters, so it makes sense that he deals with them.”

Mrs Hudson looked at him disapprovingly but just made a note and moved on. “How do you, or will you, deal with illness and injury?” 

“John’s a doctor, it’s very convenient,” Sherlock said.

Mrs Hudson nodded. “How about family? Do you want children?”

John snorted into his tea at that. Sherlock screwed his face up in distaste for a moment before a strange glint came into his eyes. John caught the look and frowned.

“No, Sherlock. You can’t experiment on children,” John said firmly. Sherlock sighed. 

“Fine, we don’t want children.”

“Have you discussed religious beliefs? Do you feel it is important to have the same beliefs?” Mrs Hudson asked.

“Sherlock’s an atheist,” John said with a shrug. “And so am I, so that’s all fine.”

“No, you’re an agnostic,” Sherlock said quietly. John looked at him and was taken aback by how very soft Sherlock’s eyes had gotten. “And that’s... fine. I don’t mind.”

Mrs Hudson continued on before John had a chance to fully process what Sherlock had said. The questions were fairly thorough, covering a range of topics from finances to vacations to respect to rituals and on and on and on, though thankfully they were fairly mundane and less invasive than the earlier questions. There was a brief moment of awkwardness when Mrs Hudson brought up adultery and jealousy, and John didn’t know what to say. If they did actually have to get married, would John continue to see other people? He wasn’t sure. John though Sherlock had tuned out by that point, but his brows furrowed and John had no idea what he could be thinking about.

When they reached the end of the hour, Sherlock sat straight up, eyes lighting up again. “Right, we’ve put up with your asinine questions, now let’s move onto the far more interesting topic of your husband and the murder he’s committed.”


	6. Part 5

They somehow managed to spend nearly the rest of the day at Mrs Hudson’s flat. For the first hour or so, Sherlock grilled Mrs Hudson for every single detail about her husband, their life in Florida, events leading up to the murder, what Mrs Hudson knew about the victim, the scene of the crime, how Mr Hudson managed to receive an aquittal. John sat, listening attentively and jotting down notes, poised to step in. It wasn’t that Sherlock wasn’t his usual insensitive self, or that Mrs Hudson was excessively resilient, they just seemed to be able to talk together easily. Sherlock just gentle enough and Mrs Hudson just robust enough that no one ended up frustrated or in tears. John was relieved and pleased to see Sherlock getting along with someone, but also a tiny bit jealous, too used to being the only one that could cope with Sherlock and in turn the only one Sherlock made an effort for. He recognised that feeling jealous was unfair to Sherlock and tried to focus on being pleased.

After he finished questioning Mrs Hudson, Sherlock dismissed them both and told them to leave so he could have a think, apparently unaware that this was not his house and he could not just order the owner around in it. Mrs Hudson didn’t seem to mind and somehow John found himself sitting on Mrs Hudson’s bed with her, watching a make-over show. And a talk show. And a cooking show. Then Mrs Hudson realised it was past lunch time and Sherlock was still deep in thinking mode, so Mrs Hudson insisted John stay for lunch. 

John and Mrs Hudson were laughing over a story about a couple she had guided once, who were convinced they were soul mates even though they were utterly unMatched and Mrs Hudson had realised, just days before they were due to be evaluated that they were siblings,

(“I couldn’t believe it!” Mrs Hudson said. “So I arranged to have their blood tested and sure enough, full-blooded siblings.”

“How had they gotten through the system?” John asked. “Don’t they test for that?”

“Oh, they do now,” Mrs Hudson said. “They’re hardly going to let a mistake like that happen more than once. Although one doesn’t like to think how many they missed in the past. Still, the poor lambs, so disappointed. But they would have made a terrible couple, even if they weren’t related. It was for the best really, and this way they can still be in close contact.”)

when Sherlock apparently smelled the commotion in the kitchen and poked his head in. 

“Are you cooking spinach and ricotta pasties?” Sherlock asked hopefully. Mrs Hudson smiled fondly at him.

“Yes, dear. And they’re about to come out of the oven,” Mrs Hudson said. “Just this once, mind you, I’m your marriage guide not your housekeeper.”

“Why would you be our housekeeper?” Sherlock asked. “We don’t live here.”

“You will let us know when we overstay our welcome, won’t you?” John said. “Otherwise there is a good chance Sherlock will just not leave.”

Mrs Hudson laughed at this, though John got the impression it wouldn’t bother Mrs Hudson if she did end up with a sort of lodger who spent his days lying on the couch demanding cheese and spinach pasties. 

In the end a case called them away just as Sherlock was finishing off the last pasty and Mrs Hudson followed them out to the street trying to organise their next appointment.

“You will be back the same time Wednesday?” Mrs Hudson said, anxiously. “Because I need to see you three times this week and once you miss one, it all just seems to fall apart.”

“It depends on how good the case is!” Sherlock said, eyes bright and mind clearly already miles away, off with the fresh corpse of a man supposedly ten years dead and an impeccably sealed tube containing a copy of a worthless painting.

“We’ll be there,” John reassured Mrs Hudson. “I can tell Lestrade we have marriage guidance and then he’ll definitely make us go. Though it might just be the one hour next time.”

Mrs Hudson gave a short laugh. “That’s fine, just make sure you’re here.”

As a taxi pulled up, Sherlock surprised them but gently grasping Mrs Hudson’s shoulders and planting a kiss on her cheek. 

“Wouldn’t miss it for the world!” Sherlock said gleefully. He stalked over to the taxi.

“Thanks,” John said. “For... for having us.”

“Of course dear,” Mrs Hudson said. “Now you’d best run along, your young man is gesturing very impatiently.”

John was about to protest when he saw the mischievous twinkle in Mrs Hudson’s eye. He smiled and followed Sherlock to the taxi.

 

They made it to the appointment on Wednesday in good time, but Sherlock alternated between being annoyed that they had to be there and cross that he hadn’t managed to solve their current case, though he insisted he was on the brink of a revelation and didn’t have time for this nonsense. Mrs Hudson tried to talk to them about the areas she’d flagged as potentially problematic, but Sherlock declared matters such as money and family “Dull!”. John was baffled when Mrs Hudson brought up their scheduling issues, as he was fairly certain they didn’t have a schedule, so couldn’t have scheduling issues, but when Mrs Hudson asked them to, for instance, walk her through their lives for the last few days Sherlock perked up and gave a long, very detailed account of the case so far. Whether through sheer coincidence or carefully planning on Sherlock’s part, he managed to hit a breakthrough the minute their hour was up and kissed Mrs Hudson exuberantly on the cheek and stalked out. John thanked her and apologised but Mrs Hudson just smiled, told him to be back the same time Friday, and waved him out.

The case was solved within the next hour, though they were stuck at NSY for several hours afterwards as Sherlock tried, with increasing levels of frustration, to get it through to the DI in charge that the empty gum wrapper was a vital piece of evidence as it meant the mother was having an affair. John had been filling out paperwork and chatting idly to one of the more attractive sergeants when he noticed the argument and the way the DI was about forty seconds away from punching Sherlock. He smiled at the sergeant and hurried over to Sherlock, feeling a familiar fond exasperation. Sherlock turned beseechingly to John to deal with “this imbecile” and John had Sherlock walk him through his thought process.

“Alright, lads?” Lestrade asked cheerfully, emerging from his office just as John and Sherlock were leaving. Sherlock groaned in frustration, but John stopped.

“Fine,” John said. “Someone nearly took a swing at Sherlock, so business as usual.”

Lestrade laughed and Sherlock glowered. “If you did not keep such incompetent idiots around slowing me down-”

“I’m hardly in charge of hiring, mate,” Lestrade said, cutting off Sherlock’s rant. Sherlock huffed. “How’s the application going?”

John shrugged. “Our guide’s nice. The conversations can be a bit awkward, but it’s bearable. Sherlock’s trying to prove her husband is guilty of murder. About what you’d expect, really.”

“Sherlock,” Lestrade said. “You can’t get around this by upsetting your guide-”

“Oh, no,” John added hastily. “Her husband, or ex-husband really, is a right bastard. I think she’s quite relieved he’s looking into it.”

“Oh,” Lestrade said. Sherlock looked smug. “Fair enough then. Let me know if you need help.” Sherlock scoffed derisively, but Lestrade ignored him. “With that or with the application.”

“Ta,” John said. 

“Why would we need your help?” Sherlock asked. “We’re trying to fail. You passed, despite your wife’s total unsuitability and endless infidelity.”

“Sherlock,” John said, a quiet warning. Lestrade’s smile became very fixed.

“No, right,” Lestrade said. “Still.”

“We’ll let you know,” John said. He walked swiftly out and Sherlock trailed behind him, confused. 

“Not good?” Sherlock asked. John stopped and closed his eyes, taking a deep breath. 

“Not good, no,” John said, opening his eyes and looking seriously at Sherlock. “Look, marriage is really serious and hard to get out of. Lestrade’s stuck married to a woman he’s got nothing in common with, and whose adultery could get them both into trouble. I don’t think he needs you to remind him of the fact. Especially not when he was just trying to help.”

Sherlock looked troubled. John reach out a hand to squeeze his upper arm, comforting and encouraging all at once. “What if we don’t fail? I don’t want us to end up like them. Hating each other. It would be detrimental to the work.”

“‘Course we’re going to fail,” John said with a laugh. “They’d be mad to let us get married.”

“Lestrade and his wife were accepted, despite their obvious incompatibility,” Sherlock pointed out.

“Yeah, but they were younger, more open and accommodating,” John said. “Lestrade would have worked less and she wouldn’t have felt the need to take out her frustrations in affairs. Plus that was twenty-odd years ago, the process is stricter now.”

Sherlock nodded and they continued home.

 

On Thursday, Sherlock buried himself in Mr Hudson’s case and John typed up their latest case, wondering if he should mention the marriage application, but decided against it. Better leave that as a note when it was rejected. “Maddest thing happened about a month ago. I received my usual monthly green envelope, but would you believe it, the DoM had decided Sherlock and I were a Perfect Match! We went through the application process, of course, but they must have realised their mistake as we were well and truly rejected. Still, Sherlock managed to solve an old case from our marriage guide’s past, so it wasn’t a complete waste of time. Bit of a laugh, really.” or something like that. 

Friday, like Monday and Wednesday, dawned and there was nothing stopping them from making it to Mrs Hudson’s on time, and Sherlock didn’t even complain, babbling something about Mr Hudson and a wrench. John wasn’t really following what Sherlock was saying, but simply enjoyed the sound of his voice, quick and excited. Mrs Hudson greeted them cheerfully and chivvied them into her flat.

“Right, I think we’ll try something different today,” Mrs Hudson said, looking unusually excited.

“Yeah?” John said apprehensively. Sherlock looked at her quizzically.

“I don’t suppose it’s couples murder solving?” Sherlock asked hopefully.

“No, dear,” Mrs Hudson said. “You’re going to cook a meal for each other!”

“Why?” Sherlock asked.

“I thought a practical task might help you get into the process,” Mrs Hudson said. “Cooking is not only one of your problem areas, it also can help you show appreciation, it lets me know how you work when set a task, and I thought it would be a nice way to spend the morning. Flat B is currently empty, so Sherlock, you can use that kitchen, and John you can use mine. You can use any food you find, but you might have to go to the shops. The only rule is you can’t talk to each other while you’re cooking. And don’t worry, this is marriage guidance, not a cooking show, so don’t worry about making anything elaborate. Stick within your limits.”

Mrs Hudson looked at them expectantly and Sherlock nodded shortly before sweeping out the door. John just grabbed a book from Mrs Hudson’s shelf and settled down on the couch. Mrs Hudson frowned at him.

“I’m just doing beans on toast,” John said. “Won’t take ten minutes. You might want to keep an eye on Sherlock though, god only knows what he’s going to do to your kitchen. Come let me know when he’s nearly done and I’ll get started then.”

 

John was unsurprised by the banging and clattering he heard above him or Mrs Hudson’s occasional, despairing, “Sherlock!”. He wasn’t particularly worried and had full faith Mrs Hudson could cope with him, so decided to let them be and enjoy an unexpected hour of relaxation. He wasn’t terribly concerned when that hour turned into two, but as the third hour drew to a close he was relieved to see Mrs Hudson pop her head in.

“He’s just finishing up,” Mrs Hudson said. “Bring your beans up when their done, Sherlock’s is... harder to transport.”

John nodded and thanked her, wondering to himself what Sherlock had created. Presumably Mrs Hudson wouldn’t make him eat it if it was poisonous, but that didn’t mean he wasn’t going to be eating something strange and inedible nonetheless. He tipped a tin of beans into a bowl, dropped in a dollop of butter and put them in the microwave before putting on two pieces of toast. Before long, the toast was buttered, plated and covered with beans and John took it upstairs.

John stopped dead at the sight of the spread on the kitchen table. Not only was the table laid beautifully with a tablecloth, cutlery and candles, but the food looked magnificent. Some sort of small bird, quail John assumed, was plated neatly with a garnish and mouthwatering smell. There was a hot roll on a bread plate beside it and a delicious looking chocolatey affair in a bowl above.

“Did Mrs Hudson do this?” John asked. Sherlock looked offended.

“No,” Sherlock said coolly. 

“No, sorry. Just, Sherlock, when the bloody hell did you learn to cook?” John demanded. Sherlock glanced at his watch.

“About two hours and thirty-five minutes ago,” Sherlock said. He grinned and John laughed.


	7. Part 6

Mrs Hudson was delighted by the success of her cooking experiment, although less thrilled when Sherlock informed her cooking was a waste of his time and he had already deleted everything he’d learned. She confirmed their Monday appointment, and Sherlock informed her that she’d probably see them before, as he was on the cusp of proving her husband guilty.

Unfortunately, Sherlock seemed to hit a wall in the Mr Hudson case and he spent the weekend alternately sulking on the couch, storming around the flat and wringing screeching noises from his violin. By the time Monday morning rolled around, John was about ready to throttle his flatmate. He was keenly aware, though, that this case was affecting Sherlock. It mattered to him on more than just a purely intellectual level. So John resisted strangling Sherlock and only snapped at him a handful of times. 

Mrs Hudson seemed pleased to see them again and that mollified Sherlock somewhat. John was struck anew by the thought of how few people were ever actually excited to see Sherlock, and any ridiculous jealousy he had over Sherlock bonding with Mrs Hudson melted away. 

They settled down on the sofa and Mrs Hudson bustled off to make tea.

“Okay, dears, today we’re back to talking,” Mrs Hudson said. Sherlock groaned, but quietened when Mrs Hudson sent him a chastening look. “We’re going to start by getting things out in the open, all your grievances, fears, frustrations, really clear the air.”

They sat in silence for a few moments before John ventured, “Sherlock still doesn’t keep his human parts on the correct shelf in the fridge. And he doesn’t label them properly.”

“John destroyed a three week experiment when he attempted to make tea with it,” Sherlock countered.

“Yeah, and I was nearly hospitalised, no thanks to you!” John said.

Things escalated quickly, but with no offer of retreat, they both said their fill and oddly enough John did feel better afterwards. Lighter, somehow. Sherlock looked like he was trying to hold onto his hurt and anger, and confused when he found he couldn’t. Mrs Hudson looked maddeningly pleased.

“There we go, dears,” Mrs Hudson said. “Important to get all that out in the open. It’ll make Wednesday much easier.”

“Wednesday?” John asked apprehensively. Mrs Hudson just smiled serenely.

“Same time suits, I assume?” Mrs Hudson said.

 

By the time Wednesday rolled around, with no case to distract Sherlock and the Mr Hudson case still frustrating him, both Sherlock and John were feeling on edge, and apprehensive about what their session with Mrs Hudson would hold. Their fears were not unfounded.

“Today,” Mrs Hudson said. “We’re going to talk about those things you never talk about. To anyone. It’s going to be hard, but it will deepen your understanding of each other and help your future relationship, whatever it may be.”

John nodded at the oblique reference to the fact that they weren’t hoping to be married one day, and got the feeling that this part was something Mrs Hudson took very seriously, beyond her role as marriage guide. Sherlock sighed, but John noticed he had tensed slightly. 

At first the discussion was awkward and stilted, needing Mrs Hudson prompting them to get anywhere. But gradually, they found themselves relaxing and opening up. John talked about growing up with an alcoholic father and Sherlock recounted a terribly lonely childhood. From there, they moved into Sherlock’s years of drug taking. He spoke frankly, heart-wrenchingly so, and John forced himself to listen quietly, though he longed to say something to fix things for the miserable young man Sherlock had been, constantly disappointed by life. Then John told stories of his time in the army, starting with the amusing anecdotes of his, at times, larger than life friends, before moving into the darker stories. The hours of aching, terrifying boredom, the sudden onslaught of activity that broke the monotony, the addictive rush of adrenaline and the satisfaction when John found himself able to be useful, to change lives with immediate tangible results. When John admitted quietly how much he had missed it when he first came back, Sherlock gave a short, tight nod that held perhaps too much understanding in it.

 

They took a break for lunch, both surprised when Mrs Hudson commented on the time. After lunch they moved into less personal, but more present concerns. Sherlock railed against his brother’s incessant interference, his overprotectiveness and constant condescension. There was a distinct feeling of a younger brother wanting his older brother’s approval, to be seen as an equal, running under Sherlock’s complaints. John didn’t dwell too much on it though; Mycroft really could be a condescending, overprotective, interfering git. John complained about Harry, worry about Harry’s drinking and failing marriage leaking into his grievances, and John was keenly aware of the fact.

A natural silence fell over them as they tried to process all they had talked about, both men feeling emotionally wrung out, and Mrs Hudson had more than once dabbed a handkerchief at her eyes.

“Thank you,” Mrs Hudson said. “Just one more question, and then we’ll be done for the day.”

John nodded and Sherlock steeled himself.

“Why have you not been married yet?” Mrs Hudson said. “Or applied for the process before now?”

“Marriage is absurd,” Sherlock declared, visibly relaxing. “I can barely stand to be around the morons that populate our planet, why on earth would I want to entangle myself with one permanently?”

John laughed, glad the heavy atmosphere they had been sitting in for hours now could be broken somewhat. Mrs Hudson tutted, but failed to look properly disapproving. She turned to John.

“And you dear?”

John paused, struck by the question. Why had he not married yet? It would have made his life easier, certainly. And he wasn’t opposed to marriage, he didn’t have Sherlock’s abhorrence of being tied to another person for life. If anything, the idea appeal to him. Having a partner in all things. Someone to lean on, to celebrate with, to love. John wanted someone to dote on, to take care of and build a life with. So why had he never married? He opened his mouth, but nothing came out so he shut it again. Sherlock looked at him and rolled his eyes.

“John is a romantic,” Sherlock said. “He’s started many relationships knowing marriage was a possible outcome, but whenever they got serious enough to prompt Match testing, he broke things off. He doesn’t want to make decisions of the heart based on careful calculations, independently verified. He wants to rush into a romantic entanglement with nothing but love and faith and a mutual dedication to making it work. John, despite his scientific profession, can be horrendously irrational at times.”

John stared at Sherlock. He wasn’t offended by what his friend had said; quite the opposite. Despite the derisive comment at the end, the whole speech was made with a fierce warmth and possibly even some admiration. And it was all true. John just hadn’t been able to phrase for himself the instinctive problem he had with Matching, separate from the quantifiable pros and cons of the system. Somehow Sherlock, who John would have said suffered from a degree of emotional illiteracy, had managed to work out what John was feeling and make it make sense.

“Do you think that’s it?” Mrs Hudson said.

“Um, I suppose,” John said. “I didn’t really know, but that sounds about right.”

“So how does this impact you going into this marriage?” Mrs Hudson asked.

Sherlock shrugged. “We’re not going to actually get married, but for your records I find John less idiotic than the general population.”

“Thanks,” John said dryly. Sherlock smiled at him and John couldn’t resist, smiling back easily with an eye roll.

“John?” Mrs Hudson prompted. 

“Oh, um,” John said. “I guess you could say Sherlock understanding where I’m coming from helps? Or, wait. No. Say I’m fundamentally unsuited to marriage under these conditions.”

Sherlock looked affronted briefly, but then it clicked. “Yes. Please change my answer too. 

Both John and Sherlock had felt a pull to please Mrs Hudson, to answer honestly and give her tasks proper effort. This was more counterproductive to their desire to fail than they had realised. Mrs Hudson clucked disapprovingly at them.

“I told you we have to do this by the book,” Mrs Hudson said. John nodded seriously.

“Right, no, sorry,” John said. Somehow he had forgotten that he and Sherlock weren’t the only ones under scrutiny during this process.

“Sorry,” Sherlock agreed. John looked at him in surprise, but didn’t comment.

“It’s fine,” Mrs Hudson said softly. “I know it’s hard. Well, that’s all for today. Same time Friday?”

 

“Lessons in intimacy?” John echoed, confused. Yesterday, John would have said Friday couldn’t have come quickly enough. Sherlock was still stumped with proving Mr Hudson’s guilt and the flat was stifling. At least seeing Mrs Hudson seemed to cheer Sherlock up. Now he was feeling nostalgic about the sound of a violin in distress.

“It’s important for married couples to be comfortable with touching each other,” Mrs Hudson explained patiently. “And they will definitely be assessing this, so I thought we’d better put in some practice. This is the last area we need to cover.”

“We’re perfectly comfortable touching each other,” Sherlock said. He poked John. “There. See?”

Mrs Hudson clucked in disapproval. 

“Are we?” John said. He wouldn’t have said Sherlock and he touched particularly, and Sherlock always seemed fairly resistant to physical interactions. 

Sherlock rolled his eyes. “A combination of extended periods of time in close quarters, the camaraderie that comes with our work together, and our natural affection for one another has led to us being quite comfortable with touch and the invasion of personal space.”

“I suppose that makes sense,” John said.

“Excellent,” Mrs Hudson said. “So this should be easy.”

Mrs Hudson had them hold hands, which John found quite strange, having never held another man’s hand. It was larger than he was used to, and rough, fingertips calloused from violin playing, small burns and cuts smattered all over from experiments and crime solving and Sherlock’s tendency to get distracted. It wasn’t hard though, and actually became quite fun when Sherlock declared this would make running together much easier and Mrs Hudson let them run around the block to test this theory.

They tried hugging next, and it was somehow quite intense. John had stood in front of Sherlock and Sherlock had wrapped his hands around John’s middle, forcing John to wrap his arms around Sherlock’s neck, Sherlock crouching slightly, John rising up on his toes. It was uncomfortable until Sherlock rested his head on John’s shoulder and all of John’s caretaker tendencies rose up and he held Sherlock warmly, feeling that strange sense of home he always felt with Sherlock. Only now he had the urge to stroke Sherlock’s hair and whisper soothing nonsense to him. Sherlock relaxed into John’s hold and they stood there, hugging easily, as though they had all the time in the world and nothing they’d prefer to be doing. When they did disentangle, Sherlock stood back and said imperiously,

“See? Perfectly capable of touching one another. Can we call it a day and move on to something more interesting?”

“Not yet, I’m afraid.” For the first time, Mrs Hudson looked actively uncomfortable. “You need to kiss.”

“What?” John said at the same time Sherlock said, “No.”

“Have to do it,” Mrs Hudson said firmly. “No question, no wriggle room.”

Sherlock rolled his eyes and stepped back towards John, swiftly bringing his lips down against John’s, startling him. It was just a brief brush of lips and their noses crashed and Sherlock head butted John and John yelped in surprise and accidentally knocked their teeth together. Sherlock withdrew quickly.

“There,” Sherlock said, his whole body tense. “Are we done now?”

“No, that was terrible,” Mrs Hudson said.

“What does that matter?!” Sherlock protested.

“You’re going to have to kiss in front of an examiner and we’ll all be in trouble if it’s as awkward as that just was,” Mrs Hudson said grimly.

 

They spent another twenty minutes practicing kissing convincingly. It was still awkward, and vaguely uncomfortable, but bearable and they managed to work out how to coordinate themselves. John was surprised by how hard he found it, having had a lot of experience kissing in the past, thank you very much. But he was too aware of what was happening, of the fact that it was Sherlock and Mrs Hudson was watching and that some unknown government employee would be critiquing them on it before long. Eventually, Mrs Hudson declared them passable and they broke apart, finding themselves unable to look at one another.

“Before we can say we’re finished, I have to inform you about your options regarding a service I am not qualified to supply,” Mrs Hudson said. “Sexual therapy can assist-”

“No,” Sherlock and John said immediately.

“Sex is an important part of marriage. It triggers pair bonding, helps you to grow closer to your partner, provides stress relief and limits the chances of seeking extramarital affection,” Mrs Hudson said. 

“Definitely not,” John said. Sherlock looked acutely uncomfortable.

“That’s fine, but I have to give you the spiel,” Mrs Hudson said, apologetically. “Well, unless you want to put it off for longer, we’ve covered enough for your application to be evaluated.”


	8. Part 7

John and Sherlock were both feeling rather uncomfortable after their session with Mrs Hudson, and, realising how awkward they would have felt alone in the flat together, decided to stay. Sherlock hunted through Mrs Hudson’s photo albums and dug through her possessions with no regard to privacy or other such social niceties that would hinder his investigation. Mrs Hudson seemed unfazed by it, so John didn’t comment and instead ended up spending the rest of the morning helping Mrs Hudson with some household maintenance.

Just as Mrs Hudson was starting to prepare some lunch, Sherlock came bounding in and grabbed John.

“Car keys!” Sherlock said. John blinked at him, but Sherlock was already moving on. He kissed Mrs Hudson’s cheek, saying again, “Car keys!” and bounded back out of the kitchen.

“I think that’s my cue to leave,” John said, with a fond smile. Mrs Hudson nodded knowingly. 

“Some of them are just so full of beans,” Mrs Hudson said. “My husband was just the same.”

John didn’t know what to say to this. Fortunately, Mrs Hudson didn’t seem to be expecting a reply.

“You’d better go on after him,” Mrs Hudson said. “Do you want me to arrange the evaluations?”

“Yeah, I suppose so,” John said. “The sooner we get this over with, the better. Not that it hasn’t been lovely getting to know you.”

Mrs Hudson smiled delightedly at this. “Oh, you. Lovely boy. I’ll let you know when your evaluation is.”

“Thanks. For everything, really,” John said. “And I’m sure Sherlock will be badgering you about your ex-husband in no time.”

 

Once home, Sherlock typed madly at his computer for about half an hour before pulling out some nicotine patches and settling down on the couch. John busied himself making lunch, and then tried to catch up with some medical journals, but he was still feeling awkward about the morning and was worried it might have changed something between them. He hated to think to think they might have lost their easy camaraderie. 

“Sherlock,” John said, after staring at the same page for nearly twenty minutes.

“John,” Sherlock said, in that distant way he had, like an automated message informing the world he was out of the office. He could still manage to have entire conversations like this, though he mightn’t remember them later. It was quite useful for when John wanted to ask Sherlock awkward or embarrassing questions. Less useful for when he needed to remind Sherlock that the microwave was not designed for storing eyeballs, of course, but such was life.

“I just wanted to check we’re fine,” John said haltingly.

“Why wouldn’t we be fine?” Sherlock said.

“After this morning," John said. “It was... well it was bloody awkward.”

“What was?” Sherlock said.

“Well, mostly just the kissing, although you should probably stop rifling through Mrs Hudson’s flat like you do.”

“Oh, yes. Kissing. Dreadful business,” Sherlock said absently. “Still, I think we got the hang of it in the end.” He didn’t seem to hear the comment about Mrs Hudson’s flat.

“Right,” John said. Apparently Sherlock had just registered it as an annoying procedure they needed to become competent at and nothing more. It was comforting, of course it was comforting, that Sherlock felt like this. It was odd too, though. Wasn’t it? Kissing should mean something. But how could it? They were doing it under duress, with an audience and knowing they would be evaluated on their technique later. How could a kiss under those circumstances be anything more than a vaguely uncomfortable procedure? And why the hell did it bother him so much that that’s all it was?

 

Sherlock was kept busy for three days following his new line of enquiry on the Mr Hudson case. He kept John updated, and John was suitably impressed by his intellectual prowess and more than a little excited by how much the case mattered to Sherlock. John’s fears that their ‘lesson in intimacy’ had ruined their easy and comfortable interactions proved utterly erroneous. If anything, the bizarre lesson combined with the week of baring souls, talking so achingly honestly, seemed to have left them very open to each other. Sherlock had taken to tugging at John’s sleeve if he felt John wasn’t responding quickly enough to whatever Sherlock needed John doing. John found himself absently touching Sherlock’s shoulder or arm when he passed him tea (or a phone, or a laptop, or whatever else Sherlock had demanded be passed to him), and lifting Sherlock’s legs so he could sit on the couch and watch TV when Sherlock was lying stretched out along the length of it. Once, John had been lying on the couch and Sherlock had collapsed onto it, dropping his head in John’s lap, apparently oblivious to John’s presence. John had just rolled his eyes and continued reading his book, settling a hand in Sherlock’s hair and neither of them thought it worth commenting on or stressing about. It was just a new dimension to their relationship. When John realised this was happening, he smiled to himself. It was a nice side effect, this new level of intimacy, and one he had not expected.

 

Mrs Hudson rang them on Tuesday and had barely managed to say hello to John and mention that she had booked their appointment when Sherlock snatched the phone away and started interrogating her about the make and model of the car she and her husband had owned when they had lived in the USA. John let Sherlock talk to Mrs Hudson, but he paced around after him, anxious to find out the date of their evaluation. His stomach twisted nervously and he contemplated calling Harry to see what her evaluation was like. He dismissed the thought as soon as it appeared, Harry would hardly want to talk about marriage and John hardly wanted to talk to Harry. In the end, after having the phone thrust back at him by Sherlock, who promptly fell back down on the couch in full ‘thinking mode’, he scrawled down the time, date and location for their appointment, thanked Mrs Hudson for all her help, and rang Lestrade.

Unfortunately, Lestrade wasn’t much help. He tried to be comforting, but his memory of the evaluations was just a lot of paperwork and waiting around nervously. John thanked him and hung up. He sighed, and looked at the note he had made.

“Evaluation’s this Friday at 11,” John told Sherlock, making his way over to the kettle. “They don’t muck around, do they?”

“Mhmm,” Sherlock said absently. Then he sat up and looked keenly at John. “You’re nervous. Why are you nervous? We’ve done it all by the book, so Mrs Hudson won’t be in trouble, and as you’ve said multiple times they’d be mad to let us get married.”

John gave a tiny breath of a laugh. “I’m just... It’s a big deal. It could change our lives. And always get anxious before exams.”

“Small amounts of stress have been proven to improve performance in exams,” Sherlock said. “But we don’t want to do well, so you’d better stop.”

“That’s the least helpful advice I’ve ever heard,” John said. Sherlock grinned at him and winked. John laughed, freely this time. “Git.”

 

Sherlock seemed to have a breakthrough in the middle of the night on Tuesday, and they spent Wednesday and Thursday putting together a case to send to the police. John channelled all his nervous energy into making the report perfect and in truth he recognised that this report was for Mrs Hudson even more important than their evaluations. That thought certainly calmed John down.

By Friday morning, Sherlock thought they had enough to get Mr Hudson convicted and John certainly thought it all seemed very solid. He suggested they get Lestrade to look it over, thinking it might add some gravitas having an official from NSY approve it. Sherlock had been so wrapped up in the case that John thought he would have to nag and badger Sherlock to leave for the marriage application evaluations, but to his surprise Sherlock was ready to go before he had a chance to bring it up, and Sherlock was the one chivvying John to get out of the house in time.

The Department of Marriage was an innocuous looking building, with a pleasant but bland and forgettable waiting room. There were signs warning against the use of phones, and John was surprised to find that he didn’t get reception anyway. He would have checked Sherlock’s phone too, but he was glared at by a security officer standing by the door. Sherlock was buzzing with anticipation as they waited for their number to be called. Once they got through this nonsense, he could go home and put the final touches on their report before taking Lestrade a copy to read over and then it could be sent off to the Florida Police Department. With any luck, Mr Hudson would be arrested by the end of the weekend.

“No need to be nervous,” the receptionist said kindly when their turn came. “Your file says you two have been flagged as a Perfect Match! I’m sure you’ll be fine.”

“I’m not nervous,” Sherlock snapped. “I want to get this over so I can arrange for a man to be arrested.”

The receptionist blinked. “Please proceed to room two.”

The evaluations took all day. There were three separate written exams, some partner activities focussed on problem solving, interviews with four different people. They were indeed required to display physical affection, and it was fine, even the kiss was quite convincing. The examiner clucked disapprovingly when she found there was very little on their file with regards to their sex lives, and confirmed that they had been offered and subsequently refused the services of a sex therapist. They knew better than to intentionally stuff it up, although Sherlock worked out which questions could be interpreted multiple ways, so while his answers were all honest, they weren’t necessarily useful or comprehensible. 

Once they finished, they left in silence, stopping on the street and looking at each other. John gave a short nod.

“That’s that I suppose,” John said.

“Indeed,” Sherlock agreed. “Chinese?”


	9. Part 8

The next week was a hellish mixture of anxiety - over the evaluation, over Mr Hudson’s case - and a feeling of complete helplessness. They had done all they could do, and now it was in the hands of other people, of strangers, to determine their fate and the fate of Mr Hudson. Sherlock aggressively played his violin and threw himself on the lounge radiating displeasure at the world. John drank a lot of tea, went for lots of walks, took a lot of deep calming breaths and only broke three mugs. Thankfully on Thursday they received a call from Lestrade; a rather gruesome murder, a disappearing murder weapon, a cousin who was in two countries at once. It was just what Sherlock needed to take his mind off things, and watching Sherlock’s brilliance and saving his stupid arse was just what John needed.

The case was amazing. Intricate, convoluted, complicated. Sherlock was on fire with it, but John could tell he was still thinking about Mr Hudson and their application. His cutting marks had more bite, his insults were more personal, he couldn’t stand to be around anyone who wasn’t John or Lestrade for more than five minutes. Yet everyone seemed oddly patient with Sherlock’s vitriolic comments and constant mood swings. John was completely puzzled by this until he accidentally overheard a conversation between Sally and Lestrade.

“Poor buggers must be half out of their mind, by now,” Lestrade had muttered.

“But why don’t they want to pass?” Sally had asked, in a tone that suggested the question had been asked more than once, to quite a few people. Lestrade had shrugged.

“It’s mental, upsetting themselves like this,” Lestrade had said. “I mean, Matching isn’t always 100%, especially when you’re younger, just look at me and the missus. But a Perfect Match? At their age? With how close they are already?”

Sally had nodded. “I never thought I’d see the freak- I mean Sherlock - Matched, but with Doctor Watson? I can actually see it.”

At this point John had forced himself to walk away before he revealed himself in a violent fashion. He hated to be talked about, insults and complaints he could cope with, but to have his relationship with Sherlock discussed like this, like they knew what John and Sherlock were feeling, it was utterly unacceptable. And he still couldn’t dismiss Sally’s insults as easily as Sherlock did, though given how quickly Sally had corrected herself it seemed Lestrade was cracking down on them, which appeased John slightly.

The case was solved in a final flurry of brilliant deductions, an exciting chase scene and a dramatic confession. High from the excitement of a case well solved, John and Sherlock found a restaurant Sherlock had a discount at and ate extravagantly, pleased with themselves and their lives. And for just a few hours, it was as if they had never received that notification, as if they were just John and Sherlock, no cares in the world beyond the occasional evil genius and overdue heating bill.

Still, life must move on, and in due time they finished their meal and headed back to their flat to catch up on sleep and rejoin the world where they mistreated their lovely marriage guide, and governments, possibly at the urging of interfering older brothers, seemed determined to marry them off.

John woke the next morning and made himself some tea and beans on toast before noticing his phone had displaying a missed call. He clicked through to hear the message and was surprised to find it contained Mrs Hudson, crying and saying “Oh boys, oh boys. I can’t believe it.” John furrowed his brow, unable to make out what else she was saying and felt his body surge with adrenaline once more. He burst into Sherlock’s room and shook him awake.

“What?” Sherlock demanded.

“It’s Mrs Hudson. She’s left me a message,” John said. “I can’t make out what she’s saying, but she sounded terribly upset.”

Instantly Sherlock was alert. He threw his bedcovers off and pushed John out of the room, demanding he get dressed immediately. John raced to his room and pulled on some jeans and a jumper haphazardly and jogged back downstairs, surprised when Sherlock emerged moments later, immaculately dressed. They ran out onto the street and Sherlock performed his taxi summoning magic. It was a tense ride to Mrs Hudson’s flat, and they kept exchanging worried glances. When the taxi stopped, Sherlock dashed out, leaving John to pay, and rapped loudly on the door to 221.

Mrs Hudson opened the door. She looked surprised to see them. “Good morning dears, did we have an appointment today?”

Sherlock looked over Mrs Hudson critically 

“You idiot!” Sherlock said, sounding frustrated but not angry. “She wasn’t upset, she was overcome with joy. Can’t you tell the difference?”

“Not over the phone!” John said. Sherlock scoffed. “Don’t scoff at me, it’s not like you asked to hear the message! Just sent me off to get dressed.”

“Oh dear, I didn’t mean to upset you with that message,” Mrs Hudson said. “I just thought you would want to know, but I couldn’t stop crying. I was just being silly.”

“Know what?” John asked.

“Her husband has been arrested, obviously,” Sherlock said, but he was too full of glee to sound properly derisive and John was too happy to be properly offended.

“No, really?” John said and Mrs Hudson threw her arms around Sherlock, who was startled, but quickly returned the gesture. John grinned. “I think this need a good cup of tea, don’t you?”

“Oh no,” Mrs Hudson said. “Tea’s all well and good, but this is a celebration that requires something a mite stronger, don’t you think?”

“And maybe some chocolate biscuits?” Sherlock said, hopefully.

 

Sherlock and John stormed into their flat, falling over each other with laughter, more than a little intoxicated. They were giggling madly when Sherlock flicked the light on and John tackled Sherlock to the floor just before he realised there was a man sitting in their lounge room.

“My, my,” Mycroft had said. “Having a good evening, then, I take it?”

“Not anymore,” Sherlock spat, John scrambled off Sherlock, pulling him to his feet and went to make tea. Sherlock flopped angrily into his armchair. “What do you want?”

“Your application has been processed, I thought you might want to hear the results right away,” Mycroft said.

“John!” Sherlock called, sitting up.

“I heard!” John replied, rushing back into the room. Mycroft pulled a pale green envelope from his suit pocket and pulled Sherlock’s letter opener out from the coffee table. He took his time opening the letter, plainly enjoying the suspense he was creating.

“‘Dear Mister Holmes and Doctor Watson,’” Mycroft read. He paused. “It actually says ‘John and Sherlock’, but I think that’s terribly informal, don’t you?”

“Get on with it,” Sherlock growled.

“Dear Mr Holmes and Doctor Watson, we are pleased to inform you that-”

“They accepted us?” John said. “They accepted us?”

“Indeed,” Mycroft said. “Felicitations to you both.”

John collapsed onto the sofa, but Sherlock stood up, towering over Mycroft and glaring.

“This is your doing, then, I take it?” Sherlock asked. Mycroft stood up and Sherlock lost his height advantage.

“Nothing of the sort,” Mycroft said smoothly. “I have no power to influence the Department of Marriage in such matters. I am merely a minor government official.”

Sherlock stalked over to the window and Mycroft picked up his umbrella, saying his farewells to John before he walked calmly out, leaving the letter behind. Once he heard the door click, John grabbed the letter and read it a few times. Unfortunately every reading heralded the same result. They had passed. Their application was successful. They were getting married.


	10. Part 9

For all that the application process had been complicated, demanding and time-consuming, actually getting married was quite quick and simple. At some stage, both Sherlock and John had ticked the box that said ‘no-frills wedding, please’ and the date for their wedding was just a week after they received the notification that their application had been successful. John had been in such a state of shock and disbelief that he didn’t realise how soon the wedding was until Sherlock asked him about his suit. 

“Will you be in your dress uniform or are you going in your brown suit?” Sherlock said. “Because you’re leaving it awfully late to have the brown suit properly dry cleaned, and you haven’t worn your dress uniform in a while, so you’ll need to allow time for it to be altered.”

John blinked in confusion and then realised what Sherlock was on about. He looked at the calendar and was appalled to find how quickly Saturday was coming. They couldn’t be getting married in five days. They couldn’t be getting married fully stop. 

“Yes, yes, I know,” Sherlock said impatiently. “Bit of a shock, how could this be happening, but we really do need to get moving on the suit front. Mummy would never forgive me if I got married to a shabbily dressed man.”

“Your mother’s coming?” John said, curious about the women responsible for bringing the Holmes brothers into the world and also acutely aware he hadn’t told Harry about everything yet. 

“No,” Sherlock said. “It’s too far for her to travel at such late notice. But she’ll demand photos.”

“Right,” John said. “I think I’ll go with the brown suit.”

Sherlock looked at him curiously, and John would have sworn he saw a glimmer of disappointment, but then Sherlock nodded and it was gone. “I’ll send it out with mine.”

“Right,” John said. He had already moved on to trying to work out if there was some way he could not invite Harry, when he realised he was probably meant to take an interest in what Sherlock was wearing. “And you? What suit will you wear?”

“If you’re in brown, I’ll go for something in grey or dark blue,” Sherlock said dismissively and John was relieved that at least he didn’t have to think about Sherlock’s clothes on top of everything else.

“Christ, what else do we need to sort out?” John said.

“The DoM seems to have taken a strangely personal interest in our case, so the reception’s all covered, and we signed up to get married in the registry office, so that’s all done,” Sherlock said. “Just inviting guests really.”

John groaned. “Do we have to?”

Sherlock laughed. “I wish we didn’t, but if we were wishing I suppose we’d wish to not get married at all so it’s a bit of a moot point. I imagine we’ll want Mrs Hudson and Lestrade, you’ll insist on Harry and Sarah, Mycroft will just show up of his own accord. Molly is a possibility, as is Mike Stamford. You’ve presumable got army buddies you’ll want to invite. In short, this is going to get much larger than we want, but again, this is hardly an event focussed on what we want.”

John looked at Sherlock, a little unnerved by Sherlock’s bitter detachment. It wasn’t anything new, and Christ knew John didn’t want to get married to Sherlock, but it seemed wrong for Sherlock to be so upset over it.

“No, look,” John said. “Unfortunately, yes, our siblings will most likely be there. And I’d like Mrs Hudson and Lestrade there too. But otherwise, it’s completely up to you. I don’t mind if you decide to invite the whole of the greater London area on the DoM’s bill, or if you just want those four and us. It’s your wedding, I don’t want you miserable.”

Sherlock studied John carefully. “It would mean something for people from your army days to be there.” John shrugged. “It would. Invite them.”

“If you like,” John said.

“John,” Sherlock said, frustration edging into his voice. “This is your wedding too.”

John took in Sherlock’s intent stare, not unused to the eyes boring into him, but finding it was surprisingly pleasant when it was because Sherlock wanted him to be happy, rather than because he wanted to work out his deepest darkest secrets. John smiled warmly at Sherlock.

“Yeah,” John said. “Let’s work it so we can both enjoy the day.”

 

In the end the guest list swelled up and was whittled down to Harry, Mycroft, Mrs Hudson, Lestrade, Molly, Mike, and an old friend from John’s army days, Bill. Sherlock was pleased with the idea of just seven, until they realised that Harry would bring Clara, Mycroft would bring Anthea, Lestrade would bring... Mrs Lestrade (John made a note to learn what her name was), Molly would bring Mr Molly (Sherlock informed John he was dull and not worth learning the name of), Mike would bring Mrs Stamford (Julia? Juliet? Something like that), and Bill would bring his wife Claire. Which meant the seven was now thirteen, and included six people Sherlock had never met, and two John had never met. Sherlock despaired at this and declared to John, “I am never going to weddings with you.”

“I think ours is the only mandatory one,” John said. “Did you go to Mycroft’s?”

“He kidnapped me,” Sherlock said. John laughed. “It was awful, all formal and polite. Everyone gossiping about their Matching scores and whether Mycroft had rigged them to be with the love of his life. Utter rot of course, Anthea was carefully selected. He needed someone respectable and undemanding and she liked the idea of a powerful husband and a lot of free time. I think she’s on a salary and they negotiate working hours and live separately, as much as possible anyway. Certainly separate apartments at least. Not to mention that she’s nearly fifteen years his junior. She couldn’t have been more than twenty-two when they got married.”

John wasn’t sure what was upsetting Sherlock so much about Mycroft’s marriage to Anthea, although it did sound pretty strange and a little disturbing, but he reached out instinctively to rub his hand soothingly along Sherlock’s arm.

“Hey, it’s okay,” John said. “Our marriage won’t be like that. It’s messed up and a bit against our wills, sure, but we’ll be fine. We’re best mates and that’s not going to change.”

“Right,” Sherlock said. “Of course.”

 

Their wedding day dawned much like any other day and John spent most of the morning on the phone with Harry, who was freaking out about Clara. Apparently they’d had a huge fight and Harry told Clara not to come to the wedding and Clara said she wouldn’t and Harry ranted about Clara for a long time, before whispering,“I don’t think we’re going to last.” John had no idea what to say to this, so murmured something generically comforting and let Harry cry for a few minutes before he claimed to have important wedding things to do and hung up.

Mrs Hudson came over after breakfast and Sherlock spent the morning allowing her to fuss over him, huffing in displeasure, though Mrs Hudson didn’t seem to take him very seriously. When John finished on the phone, Mrs Hudson had them sit in the lounge and fussed around with making tea before she said, “I’d like you two boys to move to Baker Street, with me,” Mrs Hudson said. “In the upstairs flat, of course. You’re not rooming with me and 221C gets the damp, but 221B would be perfect for you.”

“That’s very kind of you, but there’s no way we could afford it,” John said.

“Nonsense, you managed to get my husband arrested again, obviously I’d be offering you a discount,” Mrs Hudson said. She rummaged through her handbag and pulled out some papers, handing them to John. “Here you go, that’s the document I had drawn up, you just need to sign it and the flat’s all yours. Fully furnished and everything, you could move in after you finish getting married.”

“Wow, really?” John said. “This is more than generous, really.”

“It’s hard to get people in,” Mrs Hudson said, dismissively. “With the divorce, people don’t like the scandal. And what you two have done for me... It’s the least I can do.”

“Of course we’ll live there, Mrs Hudson,” Sherlock said. “Ignore John, he’s an idiot.”

“Thanks,” John said, giving Sherlock’s arm a shove. Sherlock shot him a grin.

 

The ceremony was performed quickly and before they knew it, Sherlock and John had pledged their lives to one another and signed a document confirming the fact. They posed for some photos before being whisked off in a very posh car, presumably courtesy of Mycroft, as John was sure he’d been kidnapped in it before. The reception was small and sophisticated. Sherlock hated it and when John saw the size of the portions he was inclined to agree. So it was that John and Sherlock spent their wedding reception tucked away in the corner, sitting with a bottle of expensive looking Champagne, deducing guests.

“Molly’s husband is in awe of her job,” John said. “And wishes he made as much money as her.”

“Very good!” Sherlock said, sounding delighted. “How did you work that out? Was it the cufflinks?”

“No, Molly’s talked to me in the past,” John said and he giggled before taking another swig of the champagne and handing it back to Sherlock.

“That’s cheating,” Sherlock grumbled, taking a drink.

“No it’s not,” John informed him. “You once said listening counted, I’m sure you did.”

“Fine,” Sherlock said. He took another drink and passed the bottle over. “What about... Lestrade.”

“Hmm,” John considered Lestrade carefully. “Unhappily married.”

“Obvious,” Sherlock said.

“Police officer, at wedding of friends,” John said.

“You aren’t even trying anymore., Sherlock said. John watched Lestrade carefully

“Oh! Your brother fancies him,” John said, taking a triumphant swig.

“He does not,” Sherlock protested.

“He definitely does, he keeps looking at him.”

“They’ve never even met,” Sherlock said.

“Doesn’t matter,” John said. “Still fancies him.”

“This game is stupid,” Sherlock said, snatching the bottle back.

“‘S’not a game,” John said. “It’s your livelihood.”

“Well thank heavens it isn’t yours,” Sherlock said.

“We’re married now, what’s yours is mine,” John said, demonstrating this fact by taking the bottle.

“Not if I divorce you," Sherlock threatened, pulling the bottle out of John’s reach. John pouted at him before his words sunk in.

“I suppose we could, you know.” John said quietly. “People do. It’s not completely unheard of.”

“I know, but this isn’t a problematic marriage. Given our ages, financial state, Perfect Match status and Mycroft’s interference, it’s hardly likely we’ll be granted a divorce. I wouldn’t be surprised if we were arrested for applying. What grounds do we have?” Sherlock said.

“I’m straight and you keep heads in the fridge?” John said.

“Didn’t stop them from letting us get married,” Sherlock pointed out.

“No,” John said. He didn’t think he’d drunk terribly much, but the alcohol seemed to hit him all at once and so he leaned back into his flatmate, his husband, his Sherlock. “Guess we’re stuck together. Still, could be worse.”

“Yes?” Sherlock said softly.

“Yeah,” John said. “If you have to be married, your best friend isn’t a bad option. Imagine if they’d tried to marry me off to Sally!”

“Or Anderson.”

“Or Mycroft.”

“Wash your mouth out!”

They dissolved into giggles and John couldn’t help but think as far as the government making you marry your flatmate went, this wasn’t half-bad.


	11. Part 10

Mrs Hudson insisted ‘her boys’ move into Baker Street right away and had arranged for people to pack up the flat while they got married. Both Sherlock and John were quite tipsy when they stumbled into 221b, bidding Mrs Hudson a goodnight and then working out which boxes held their boxers (a sentence that had amused John immensely and Sherlock decided the solution was to switch John over to briefs, and left himself a note to this affect that would baffle him in the morning). Somehow they managed to find pyjamas to get changed into and toothbrushes and were feeling quite chuffed with themselves when the tumbled into the bedroom and realised they had a problem.

“One bed,” John said, helpfully. “Two of us. ‘S’not right, is it?”

“Your maths is impeccable,” Sherlock agreed. “I’ll take the couch. I slept on our old one all the time, and with your shoulder-”

“Nah,” John said. He slung an arm around Sherlock’s shoulder. “We passed our intimacy exam, didn’t we? We’re fully qualified to share a bed.”

Sherlock hesitated. “If you’re sure.”

“‘Course,” John said. “Be stupid to make you sleep on the couch. Wouldn’t want to waste all that training.”

Sherlock smiled and they tumbled into bed.

 

When John woke up the next morning, he was acutely aware of three things. Firstly, his head pounded and they should outlaw sunlight. Secondly, there was a large, Sherlock shaped creature draped over his person. And thirdly, he was having a perfectly normal bodily reaction that was apparently following the primary school method of making friends and poking the thigh of said Sherlock shaped creature. Despite his headache, John had worked out that the Sherlock shaped thing could not be Sherlock, because that would be acutely mortifying and if Sherlock woke up to find John had an erection attacking his thigh, well, that definitely seemed like it was on the list of things that could ruin friendships and make John want to never make eye contact with Sherlock ever again.

As soon as John tried to ease himself away from Sherlock, Sherlock sort of snuggled in closer and mumbled a protest.

“Um, Sherlock? I need to get up and use the bathroom,” John said. Sherlock must have woken up properly because his muscles tensed slightly, he started to move away and then froze.

“John?” Sherlock said.

“Is this about the fact that I am poking you in the thigh?” John said, conceding defeat in his plan to live a life without excessive amounts of humiliation.

“No, well, yes, well,” Sherlock said, scrambling for words. John was taken aback by this lack of eloquence before he realised what was going on.

“You too?” John said. He gave a rueful, embarrassed smile and to his surprise Sherlock blushed furiously. John tried to shift away from Sherlock and quickly became aware of why Sherlock had abandoned his attempts at moving away. Having only ever slept with women, John found the sensation of another man’s erect penis brushing against him very strange. Especially when he somehow made them brush against each other and it was not wholly unpleasant. Mostly it confused his hung over brain, but his cock didn’t protest, and that confused him further. John didn’t let it bother him for long though, he simply disentangled himself and headed to the bathroom, thinking Sherlock probably wanted to be left alone. John had been pretty uncomfortable the first time he had woken up doing that to a girl he dated, and if this was the first time it had happened to Sherlock it was pretty easy to imagine he was feeling more than a little bit awkward about it.

 

By some mutual, unspoken agreement, they didn’t talk about how they had both woken up that morning, and instead they focussed on getting themselves unpacked and settled into the flat.

John opened the top drawer of his bedside table and shut it again quickly when he spotted the box of condoms, bottle of lube, and note saying, ‘Just in case! Mrs Hudson xx’.

“Don’t open this drawer,” John warned.

“Contraception and lubricant?” Sherlock said, continuing to put his socks carefully away. “There’s some in my drawer too. She’s very thorough. There’s even an anti-venom kit under the sink.”

Sherlock sounded quite impressed and John just rolled his eyes and made a note not to look in the top drawer, and then maybe he could hold onto some peace of mind, despite the sudden turn his life had made.

Later, when John finished unpacking their meagre kitchen supplies, he realised he hadn’t checked out upstairs yet. The second bedroom had been transformed into a study, which Sherlock was now filling with various bits of chemistry apparatus.

“Sherlock?” John said.

“Yes, John?” Sherlock said, not looking up from unloading beakers.

“Um, so you’ve decided that this can be your lab?” John said.

“I thought it made the most sense,” Sherlock said. “It’s quite well ventilated, considering, and you can use the desk in the living room for your writing, you hardly need a whole room.”

“Right, but didn’t you think we might turn this into a second bedroom?” John said.

Sherlock carefully put down the flask he was holding and turned his attention to John. “Mrs Hudson did say it could be converted into a nursery, but since we last talked about children you’ve made no indication you had changed your mind on that particular topic.”

“Not for a baby, Sherlock!” John said. “For one of us.”

“You said you didn’t mind if we shared a bed?” Sherlock said. 

“Well, no, it doesn’t bother me,” John said. “But-”

“And you’ve frequently complained that keeping experiments in the kitchen is at best unhygienic and at worst deadly,” Sherlock said.

“I, yes. That is true.” John stopped and thought for a moment. He imagined a kitchen in which he could make tea and it would be tea. Where he could make beans on toast and not have to clean bats from the breadbox, eyes from the microwave, and rest assured there were no animal droppings mixed up in the beans. It was rather an attractive prospect, and if the price of it was sharing a bed with Sherlock, a man who didn’t even sleep that much, well, it seemed like a bargain really. Sherlock must have been able to read John’s acceptance in his face because he bounded back down the stairs to fetch another box.

 

John had anticipated that it would take at least a few days for them to settle into their new flat and newly wedded state, but fortunately instead they were back to solving cases before he’d had a chance to finish unpacking their living room. This time, they were approached by a friend of Mrs Hudson’s, who had heard about their success with Mr Hudson.

The case was going well, it wasn’t the most interesting or complex case they’d ever had, but it required Sherlock to revise his knowledge of semaphore which provided John with a few hours of entertainment. There wasn’t time to worry about being married when you were worried about being shot, or if one should have been firmer with one’s flatmate about sharing a bed, when one was worrying about said flatmate sleeping at all. In short, everything was going swimmingly until just after they had solved the case and stopped Mr Richardson from losing his livelihood and they met with his daughter, Sophie, who had come to settle the bill.

“I can’t thank you enough,” Sophie said. “Really, my Dad’s life would have been ruined if you hadn’t come along to save the day.”

“No worries, all part of the service,” John said. He smiled at her and she grinned back. Beside him, Sherlock glowered. “Of course, it was Sherlock here who did most of the work; he’s the brains, I’m just the pretty face.”

Sophie giggled. “Well, I won’t argue with that.”

John laughed, accepted their payment and showed her out the door. Sherlock had flopped dramatically over the sofa when he came back, so John decided it was time for some tea.

“Did you have to flirt with her?” Sherlock demanded, startling John slightly.

“I wasn’t flirting, she’s years too young for me,” John said, wrinkling his nose. He poured the water into their mugs.

“Well she certainly seemed to think you were,” Sherlock said. “Her eyes dilated. I obviously couldn’t take her pulse, but her breath definitely quickened. 

“Next time, I’ll tell them I’m married, okay?” John said with a laugh. He shook his head, amused and slightly pleased to think the pretty young woman had been flirting with him, had been attracted to him. John put some tea in front of Sherlock and lifted his legs, sitting down to catch up on some crap telly. Sherlock continued to sulk, but John ignored him, he always got a bit like this when cases were solved too easily. Not that John considered their dramatic chase of the perpetrator easy, but the puzzle had been straight forward enough. Still, things would be back to normal in no time, John was sure.


	12. Part 11

Living in the flat above Mrs Hudson had quite a lot of advantages. Their fridge always seemed to have fresh milk and vegetables, their fruit bowl was full of fruit, their breadbox full of bread. Mrs Hudson frequently popped up for a cuppa, a packet of biscuits in hand for Sherlock and full of gossip about Mrs Turner’s couples. John could always go down and watch some telly with her if Sherlock was being particularly irritating. Sherlock even put body parts in opaque, labelled containers after he received a dressing down from a slightly hysterical Mrs Hudson holding a human heart. As much as Mrs Hudson liked to remind them she was their landlady, not their housekeeper, she really did make their lives in 221b much simpler. Or at least she did, until one unfortunate conversation about two weeks after they had moved in.

“Yoohoo!” Mrs Hudson called.

“Come in!” John said. “Kettle’s just boiled. Sherlock’s popped out, but whatever you’ve been baking smells fantastic.”

Mrs Hudson settled herself down on the lounge and put a tray of cakes on the coffee table. John brought over their fancy tea service, as was his habit when Mrs Hudson visited.

“Ah, lovely, thank you dear,” Mrs Hudson said. “How are you?”

“I’m fine,” John said. “The clinic work’s dropped off a bit, but I was expecting that. It’ll pick up again in the holidays. How’s the hip holding up?”

“Dreadful as ever,” Mrs Hudson said cheerfully. “And what’s Sherlock getting himself up to?”

“He’s visiting Molly, so I expect there will be some new, exciting body part for the fridge when he gets back,” John said. Mrs Hudson grimaced, but John sounded fond. “Any new gossip from Mrs Turner?”

“Oh, yes!” Mrs Hudson said, sitting up. “She’s gotten a Perfect Match couple! She’s trying to lord it over me, but anyone can see you two are clearly a superior Match.”

John laughed hesitantly. “Thanks, Mrs Hudson. We’re not really a couple, though; we didn’t want to get married, so she might have that over you.”

“Oh, I know dear, but it seems to have turned out all right, in the end,” Mrs Hudson said.

“What?” John said.

“You and Sherlock, you seem to be making a bit of a success of it, really,” Mrs Hudson.

“A success of what?”

“Being married, of course,” Mrs Hudson said. She laughed. “I know you were against it to start with, but I am pleased to see you’ve taken to it now.”

“We’re not-” John said. He swallowed hard. “I mean, yes, we’re married, but we’re not really.”

“What are you talking about?” Mrs Hudson asked, perplexed. “You’re not seeing other people are you?”

“Not at the moment, but-” John said.

“And you’re sharing a bed?” Mrs Hudson said. “Very quietly, which I appreciate. Thank you, dear.”

“Well, no,” John said. “I mean, we share a bed, but not... like that.”

“And you love Sherlock?” Mrs Hudson said.

“I- like a friend,” John said.

“I think that’s where Mr Hudson and I went wrong,” Mrs Hudson wistfully. “Apart from the drinking, gambling and... so on. We were never friends.”

“No, look, really, we’re not married beyond what we have to be,” John said firmly. Mrs Hudson studied him carefully.

“Oh,” Mrs Hudson said. “Okay. Sorry. You can see how I might have got confused, though?”

“Yeah,” John said, relieved he had got the point across. Mrs Hudson smiled at him sympathetically and patted his knee.

“Don’t stress about it, dear,” Mrs Hudson said. “Just do what makes you happy.”

 

Long after Mrs Hudson had left, John sat in his armchair, thinking hard. His conversation with Mrs Hudson had knocked him around a bit. If their landlady, the woman who knew not only how much they had been opposed to getting married, but who was also such a big part of their day to day lives, thought he and Sherlock had shifted into a romantic relationship it told John he needed to reevaluate their current situation. 

Sherlock bounded in a few hours after Mrs Hudson left, greeting John cheerfully and heading for the kitchen. John followed him, steeling himself for a serious conversation, knowing he had to make the boundaries very clear, or Sherlock would just ignore them.

“Sherlock?” John said.

“Mmm?” Sherlock said, unpacking what looked like gangrenous toes into a red plastic container.

“Do you think we’ve become a bit, well, married?” John said. Sherlock laughed.

“I think with the marriage certificate and rings, we’re about as married as you can get,” Sherlock said.

“No, I mean we live like a properly married couple,” John said. “Mrs Hudson thought we were... thought we’d shifted into a romantic relationship.”

“Did she?” Sherlock said absently. “I gather you corrected her on the matter.”

“Yes, took a bit of insisting, but I managed,” John said.

“Then what’s the problem?” Sherlock said.

“You can see how she might have got confused,” John said.

“Can I?”

“Sherlock,” John said impatiently. “Don’t you think it’s a bit odd? I mean, we share a bed for Christ’s sake.”

Sherlock put his toes in the fridge, shut the door and turned to focus on John. “But we talked about this. It’s simply an efficient use of space.” He seemed genuinely baffled and John gritted his teeth in frustration.

“You mean you decided it and didn’t check with me first,” John said.

“No, we discussed it. I told you my reasoning and you agreed. Why are you changing your mind now?” Sherlock had the gall to even sound a little bit hurt about this, which didn’t help John’s rising fury.

“We can’t just share a bed because I don’t like experiments in the kitchen!” John shouted. “That’s ridiculous! I want separate rooms and for you to keep deadly toxins away from where we prepare food. I don’t think that’s too much to ask for!”

“But why?” Sherlock asked.

“Why do I want my own bedroom?” John asked, his voice carrying a hint of mockery.

“Precisely,” Sherlock said.

“Because I want my own space, away from my mad flatmate. I want my own privacy,” John said.

“You’ve never minded before,” Sherlock said. “I’ve shown almost no regard for your notions of personal space in the past and not once have you indicated that it upset you.”

“Look, I don’t really care if you dig through my stuff or borrow my laptop,” John said. “Sometimes I wish you didn’t but that doesn’t bother me.”

“Then what’s the problem?” Sherlock said, his voice rising with frustration.

“You can’t work out why I would want my own personal bed and some privacy?” John said incredulously.

“No!” Sherlock said. John took a deep breath, calming himself down, reminding himself Sherlock, for all his brilliance, could be a bit naive when it came to some areas, and it wasn’t fair to be impatient with him when he genuinely didn’t understand something.

“I want to go on dates, and sometimes I want those dates to continue at home,” John said. “In the bedroom, which is awkward if your flatmate is there, or wants to go to bed while my date is still here, or wants use of the bed in the period of time between the date leaving and the sheets being washed. Surely even you can see that?”

“No,” Sherlock said.

“Sex,” John said. “I’m talking about having sex with a woman, and I would really rather you weren’t present while I’m doing so, and I would feel uncomfortable making you sleep in soiled sheets.”

Sherlock screwed up his nose in distaste, giving his head a slight shake.

“I mean, no, I don’t want you going on dates,” Sherlock said. “I don’t want you sleeping with other people.”

“What?” John said, and now it was his turn to look confused.

“We’re married, I don’t want you going out with other people. And I certainly don’t want you having sex with them in our bed,” Sherlock said.

“It shouldn’t even be ‘our’ bed!” John said, throwing his hands up. “There should be no ‘our’ bed problem. There should be a ‘your’ bed and a ‘my’ bed, and a ‘what happens in my bed is none of your business’ policy.”

“No, I don’t want that policy,” Sherlock said. John took another deep breath and tried to work out what the problem was. 

“I know adultery is looked down on, but of course I would be discrete,” John said carefully. “I’d never do anything that could get us into trouble.”

“That’s not the issue,” Sherlock said firmly. “We’re married, and so I should have a say in who you sleep with.”

“You want to vet my dates?” John said.

“No!” Sherlock said impatiently. “I don’t want there to be any dates. We’re married.”

“On paper!” John said. “That’s all, it’s not real, it doesn’t affect anything, it doesn’t matter!”

“It matters,” Sherlock said. “No matter how much we didn’t want to get married, we are now and it has changed things. Changed our relationship. I thought you understood that.”

“It hasn’t changed anything,” John said. “Except for some reason made you jealous and possessive.”

Sherlock opened his mouth, but nothing came out. John gave a short nod and walked out of the flat. 

Sherlock stared at the door for a long time.


	13. Part 12

John felt angry, confused and strangely hurt by the argument he and Sherlock had. It was frustrating because John had _allowed_ Sherlock to take over the second bedroom, forcing them to share, rather than having _agreed_. Which wasn’t Sherlock’s fault. Sure, Sherlock was pushy and usually quite relentless with a breed of logic that sometimes only made sense to himself, but John hadn’t argued. Hadn’t disagreed. Not at the time, and not in the days that had followed. 

The bed issue John thought he could take half the blame for. Sherlock’s insistence John didn’t date, though, that was unexpected and rather baffling. And Sherlock’s belief that their relationship being defined by the government as a marriage had changed things, altered their relationship into something with new meaning, felt like it had come out of nowhere.

But John couldn’t deny that the marriage preparation had been fairly intense and that for better or worse, he and Sherlock were now tied together for the rest of their lives. He tried to work out if Sherlock was just being possessive towards him because for the first time Sherlock had a serious claim on John, but John dismissed that as intensely unfair to both Sherlock and their friendship. Which John hoped to god he hadn’t just lost.

His friendship with Sherlock had always been more full on, more insular and consuming than any other friendship he’d ever had. It shouldn’t have surprised John that marrying Sherlock would be more complicated and challenging than any ideas of marriage he had. But though being Sherlock’s friend could prove difficult at times, it was also richly rewarding. Beneath his rudeness, tactlessness, and sometimes caustic personality, John knew Sherlock was capable of great kindness, deep love and tremendous loyalty. And being Sherlock’s friend had changed John. Maybe being Sherlock’s husband didn’t have to just be formality, an inconvenience, a strain on their friendship. Maybe it could be a chance for them to grow together into better people. 

 

John walked up the stairs with a heavy heart. He tentatively opened the door, still not entirely sure what he was going to do or say to fix things. As he entered the room, Sherlock was waiting on the other side, staring at him, looking lost and worried and John didn’t need to think. He walked right over to Sherlock and wrapped a hand around the nape of Sherlock’s neck, pulling him down to bring their lips together, a small press, not really a kiss, just a comfort. A reassurance that things could be okay. Then he tilted his head, resting their foreheads against one another, just breathing in the same air. At some point, John’s other hand had come to stroke down Sherlock’s side and Sherlock was clutching at John’s shirt. Once John felt their breaths even out and Sherlock’s hold lost its frantic edge, John stepped slightly back, moving one hand from Sherlock’s neck to his shoulder and down his arm, the other shifting over Sherlock’s hip with a gentle squeeze before it was withdrawn. He looked at Sherlock seriously.

“Marriage is... being married is different,” John said. “I get that now. Our lives are entangled; for better or worse, we belong to one another. What I do affects you, and you have a right to voice an opinion on matters like sex and dating. I’m sorry I didn’t see that.”

Sherlock nodded. “I have come to the conclusion that our relationship is suffering from a lack of good communication. I had no idea that you were unhappy with the state of affairs.”

“That’s not your fault,” John said. “I didn’t say anything.”

“I didn’t ask,” Sherlock said. “About anything. I just assumed everything was fine.”

John nodded. “We’ll both work on talking more, then.”

The next morning John woke alone, and though that was hardly unusual it did make him think about the fact that it looked like Sherlock was the only person he could expect to wake up with in the future. The thought was at once comforting and scary. Best dealt with on a full stomach and a decent cup of tea.

“John,” Sherlock said, sounding pleased when John entered the kitchen. “You’re awake.”

“Or thereabouts,” John said. “Tea?”

“Please,” Sherlock said.

They breakfasted in companionable silence, but as John found himself waking up more, he realised Sherlock was strangely restless. On edge, possibly even nervous.

“Everything alright?” John asked.

“Yes,” Sherlock said.

“Good, good,” John said. “You just seem a bit anxious or something.”

“Right,” Sherlock said. “I simply wish to discuss a delicate matter and have not yet worked out how to go about it. Or gathered up the courage, I fear.”

“Go ahead, it’s only me,” John said.

“But that’s the issue causing me concern,” Sherlock said. “It’s you. I don’t much care if I alienate others, but I realised when you left that the thought of estranging you is unacceptable.”

John nodded, feeling rather guilty. “Right, no. I get that. But I realised that I need to make sure I understand what you are saying and where you’re coming from before I react to things. Please trust me to do that.”

John held Sherlock’s eye, trying to pour understanding into his gaze.

“Very well,” Sherlock said. John picked up his tea. “Sex. I feel we should be engaging in it.”

It was only through sheer force of will and excellent reflexes that John managed to avoid choking on his tea. He swallowed carefully and put the cup down.

“Sex?” John said.

“Intercourse, copulation, coitus,” Sherlock said. “Although I’m not sure yet which sexual acts I would be comfortable with.”

“Right, but you are saying that you want us to have a sexual relationship?” John said.

“Yes,” Sherlock said.

“Could you explain why?” John said.

“I would have thought that was obvious,” Sherlock said.

“Indulge me,” John said. “I want to make sure we’re on the same page. I want to make sure we’re not reading entirely different books.”

“The most obvious reason, and indeed the one that inspired the idea, is that you are a sexual being,” Sherlock said. “I have observed that over the course of our friendship you have pursued the types of romantic relationships that would involve, at some stage, sex. Not all did, of course, but your desired it nonetheless, and it was consistently one of your expectations of a relationship.”

“Sherlock, just because I like sex and assumed it would be part of my romantic relationships doesn’t mean we need to be having sex,” John said. “I’m actually rather adept at going without.”

Sherlock nodded. “Still, I require your sexual fidelity; it seems unfair to deny you all sexual interaction.”

“Sherlock,” John said seriously. “You don’t owe me sex. Ever. For any reason.”

“Sex in a relationship has a myriad of other advantages,” Sherlock said. “Mrs Hudson mentioned them once and I’ve done a lot of research. Experts all seem to agree sex has the potential to have significant benefits in a marital situation, as well as to people’s general well-being.”

“Right,” John said. “Still not, you know, a reason to have sex. But we’ll get to that. The other issue I have with it I would have thought fairly obvious.” John said.

“Your sexuality,” Sherlock said. “Yes, I accounted for this in my calculations.”

“You accounted for this?” John said.

“Yes,” Sherlock said. “It is well established that human sexuality is frequently fluid in nature so that alone wouldn’t guarantee failure. In addition, I have noted that you are very comfortable with my form, and frequently show signs of attraction. I think it would be worthwhile attempting, but if you don’t like it, we obviously don’t have to continue the practice.” 

“Right,” John said. “I think I understand where you are coming from, and I’m not upset, I just think you’ve missed something.”

“What?” Sherlock asked, looking like he was running over his calculations and unable to find the error.

“Sex is... It’s more than just a physical interaction,” John said. “When two people come together in that way, it means something, irrespective of what the people mean to each other. I don’t know how much is culture and how much is biology, but having sex with another person can’t be treated the same way that, I don’t know... assisting someone carrying a heavy piece of furniture would be. It affects us, it can hurt us if done for the wrong reason, it’s something you should ideally only do for good reasons.”

“Like kissing?” Sherlock asked. John cocked his head questioningly. “Kissing someone is more intimate than shaking someone’s hand, it can be used to convey a range of emotional messages and it is generally accepted that kissing is a practice that should be kept exclusively to those who love or desire one another.”

“No, that’s right,” John said. “Exactly. Sex, like kissing, means something and so should be done with that in mind.”

“You kissed me yesterday,” Sherlock said softly.

“What?” John said.

“When you came back, you kissed me. Not to appease a witness or as part of the ridiculous application process. You kissed me because it meant something,” Sherlock said. “I want us having sex to mean something similar.”

“Oh,” John said. He looked at Sherlock, eyes gentle, not quite smiling, but mouth fond. 

He kept his eyes on Sherlock for a long moment, thinking hard. He didn’t know how it had come to this point, but somewhere along the way things had changed so much that kissing his mad and very male flatmate- husband - was presenting itself as not only a very logical thing to do, but also something very desirable. John didn’t know what this meant about himself, his sexuality, his identity, but to not proceed along this path felt wrong. He wanted to do this; it was important to both him and Sherlock to do this. He could figure out the rest later. Right now, there was only one thing to do.

John stood up and Sherlock followed his movements keenly as John came around to Sherlock’s side of the table and cupped the back of Sherlock’s head, leaning down to kiss Sherlock softly, coaxingly. It took Sherlock a few brushes of John’s lips on his to work out what he was doing, then he tentatively kissed back. Kissing, as a concept was not something Sherlock was unfamiliar with. Kissing as a practice was something Sherlock had recently gained experience in, felt comfortable saying he could do convincingly. Kissing to convey and receive affection, comfort and to raise lust was completely different to all that Sherlock understood about kissing.

When Sherlock became more confident and more aggressive in his kissing, John placed his hand at Sherlock’s elbow and as John pulled away, he made sure Sherlock followed, breaking away briefly to ask, “Bedroom?” Sherlock nodded and they resumed kissing, John now moving his hands to unbutton Sherlock’s shirt as he backed him into the bedroom. Sherlock pulled at the tie of John’s dressing gown, then pushed it off John’s shoulders to drop on the floor. Undressing each other was not as awkward as Sherlock had been expecting, as they moved slowly, unhurried, dropping down for small sips of kisses. Once naked, John gently took Sherlock’s hands and slid them down his own chest, releasing them to explore Sherlock’s skin in a similar fashion. John kissed Sherlock’s bare shoulder, not wanting to tell Sherlock what to do, but wanting to give him an idea of what he could be doing. 

“Shouldn’t we be deciding who will be the penetrating partner and who will be the receiving?” Sherlock asked, voice tight.

“We don’t have to do that right now,” John murmured. “We don’t have to do that ever if we don’t want to. Anal sex is just one option. Besides, I think this is nice right now. Is this okay with you?”

Sherlock nodded and tension eased out of his body.

 

Later, when Sherlock lay bonelessly beside him and was submitting to being cleaned up without protest, John looked over him carefully.

“You alright?” John asked.

“That was... unexpected,” Sherlock said. “I’m fully aware of the biological processes involved in orgasms of course, but it doesn’t capture the experience precisely.”

John turned to look at him. “You’ve never had an orgasm?”

Sherlock blushed. “I... not many. Not frequently anyway. And it’s different with a partner.”

John smiled. “Bit different, yeah.”

“I gather you found it agreeable?” Sherlock said.

“Yeah,” John said.

“Good,” Sherlock said. “That’s... good.”

John let out a soft breath of a laugh before turning pensive.

“I’m sorry I almost ruined things.”

“Don’t- I’m sorry, too,” Sherlock said. “Can we just let it go?”

“Okay,” John said. Sherlock tugged John down to lie beside him. It might have been ten in the morning, but John was always sleepy after sex irrespective of the time. He burrowed into Sherlock’s side, encouraging Sherlock to hold him close and soon drifted serenely off to sleep. Sherlock wasn’t tired in the least, but was content to lie there, holding John for the time being.

“I know sex means something,” he whispered into John’s skin. “That’s why I didn’t want you sleeping with other people.”


	14. Part 13

Life in 221b continued on in a strange way. John couldn’t quite wrap his head around his and Sherlock’s relationship, somewhere in the nebulous region between friends and lovers. In some ways they were closer than they had ever been before, but sometimes John was aware of a wall in between them, something that hadn’t been there before. For the most part, though, life seemed to go on as it had before. There were cases and cups of tea with Mrs Hudson, John’s work at the clinic picked up and dropped off again, they fought over keeping pig’s blood in the bathtub and found they didn’t enjoy sex in the shower. 

John worried if he was meant to let other people know his relationship with Sherlock had changed. They had told the world they were just friends, even if the government had thought them the nearest thing to soul mates. It had seemed important then to tell people that they weren’t a couple, so did that mean it was important to tell them they weren’t really simply friends anymore? Could he, when he wasn’t really sure what they actually were?

 

Mycroft visited them a few days after their fight and John’s desperate hope that he was unaware of the changes in their bedroom was crushed when Mycroft gave him a thin lipped smile and said, “I hope you know what you are doing.”

“He’s not bad,” Sherlock said coolly, smirking when Mycroft shifted slightly, the closest Mycroft came to displaying discomfort. “Seems fairly knowledgeable.”

John stared desperately into his mug of tea, wishing he could be anywhere else. Sherlock and Mycroft stared at each other for a long time before Mycroft gave a sharp nod and stood up.

“Good day, Doctor Watson,” Mycroft said and he turned neatly and walked calmly out. John felt a tiny bit like he had been threatened, though Mycroft had said nothing menacing. It was interesting, because when Mycroft did threaten him, John usually just felt irritated.

“Do I want to know how your brother is now aware we’re sleeping together?” John said.

“Probably not,” Sherlock said. 

 

It was around two weeks after John and Sherlock were settled into their new relationship before Sherlock grow restless enough that they were rather relieved when Lestrade called them in for a grisly murder suicide. A case involving two apparent strangers with no connections and no motivations, in a school gym neither was associated with.

John watched Sherlock stalk around the gymnasium, running, stopping, jumping, pulling out his magnifying glass to inspect windows and doors and god only knew what else. He realised he had been smiling a bit too softly when Lestrade coughed politely beside him.

“You two worked it all out then?” Lestrade said. John frowned.

“Worked out what?” John said.

“Passing the application,” Lestrade said. “Being married. I didn’t get to talk to you at the reception, you two disappeared pretty quickly. But you seem to have it all sorted.”

John shrugged. “We didn’t expect to pass, so it was a bit of a shock, but we’re dealing with the situation.”

“You seem happier about it now, though,” Lestrade said. “I thought you were going to punch the registrar at the wedding.”

“The temptation was there,” John said. “All that guff about a Perfect Match and helping to make our country great. I’ve always thought of myself as fairly Queen and Country, but it’s hard to see how marrying Sherlock helps Britain.”

Lestrade laughed. “I think the missus rather liked that bit.”

“Sir, the fr- Sherlock’s managed to break something,” Sally said, jogging up to Lestrade. John looked over to see Sherlock looking outraged at a broken bullhorn. 

“Christ,” Lestrade said. “Put that down and don’t touch anything else!”

Lestrade ran over to Sherlock. Sally moved closer to John.

“Your husband’s going to create a lot of paperwork for us,” Sally said. John swallowed down on his automatic denial of their relationship and forced himself to stay calm.

“Mmm, but he’s also going to solve your case, maybe even save some lives,” John said. 

“Maybe,” Sally allowed. She looked at John curiously. “So what’s it like? Being married to him?”

“It’s fine,” John said. Which roughly covered frustrating and exciting and confusing and comforting and occasionally quite marvellous, so John felt comfortable leaving it at that.

Sally nodded. “Well you have my number if you ever need it.”

John sort of wished he’d told her that Sherlock could sometimes be impossibly sweet in the strangest ways, making sure Mrs Hudson bought John’s favourite brand of tea; never playing Bach because it reminded John of his mother’s funeral; apologising for using the last of the full cream milk while not noticing he had eaten John’s lunch; talking with him while John watched his favourite movies, but staying silent when John watched news of the war. But he was glad he hadn’t, because he liked keeping those snippets of Sherlock to himself. They were special because Sherlock had given them to him freely, because he cared about and trusted John even though he shunned the rest of the world. John just didn’t like leaving Sally thinking that he still saw Sherlock as his mad flatmate and their marriage as a big mistake and terrible inconvenience.

 

Not long after the case was solved, John’s clinic work picked up again and Sarah cornered him as soon as there was a lull in patients. She walked into his office with a cup of coffee and shut the door behind her.

“John, it’s been too long,” Sarah said, smiling at him and half-sitting on his desk.

“I know,” John said. “I’ve been really swamped.”

“I’ll bet, with the wedding and everything,” Sarah said. Her smile was slightly fixed and she seemed more distant than John had ever known her. “How’s married life treating you?”

John thought quickly about what to say to Sarah. He respected her immensely, and didn’t want to lie to her, but the truth was so complicated. He was conscious they might have married if not for the dangerous and disruptive lifestyle he shared with Sherlock. It seemed rude to say anything that could be interpreted as wedded bliss. He settled on a jovial, “I’m not sure I’m over the shock yet!” and steered the conversation onto other topics.

 

After Harry had got drunk and weepy at his wedding and offended pretty much everyone he knew, John had considered vowing to never talk to her again, but it didn’t feel right somehow. She was his sister and she was having a hard time. Still, their communication remained strictly on a written level, texting and the odd comment on his blog, for a long time after. Nearly two months had passed before John realised her birthday was coming up and he couldn’t just not see her indefinitely. She was sober when he rang to organise going out for lunch, which was nice, but he dreaded seeing her, which made him feel rather guilty.

“Harry,” John said, standing up to kiss her on the cheek when she walked into the cafe. She was neatly dressed, did not reek of alcohol, and there was no vomit anywhere, a tremendous improvement from last year. “Happy birthday!”

“Thanks,” Harry said. 

“Take a seat, order anything you like, lunch is on me,” John said, smiling perhaps a touch too cheerfully.

Harry looked at him and was silent for a few moments, breathing with deliberate evenness before she sighed and said, “Fuck, I can’t sit here for an hour with you looking so goddamned happy about your life. I’m sorry John.”

John stared after he as she left the restaurant and stalked across the road. They’d never been close, and there had been a lot of fights in the past, but that had been an entirely new, and rather baffling, reaction.

 

Mrs Hudson had been such a big part of their preparations for marriage and had helped them immeasurably in settling into their new life that it seemed rude to keep her in the dark about the state of affairs, especially when it meant she would be unaware of what she risked seeing when she wandered into the flat as she was prone to doing. So John screwed up his courage, accepted the fact that this would be awkward and went down to visit her one evening, nearly five weeks after he had accepted that being married to Sherlock was more complicated and meaningful than he’d allowed for.

“I just wanted to let you know something about Sherlock and me,” John said, after Mrs Hudson had settled him down with tea and he had inquired after her hip.

“Yes dear?” Mrs Hudson said.

“We’ve decided that things would make more sense or, no, would be better if, I mean- well, we’re having sex,” John said awkwardly.

“Yes, dear, I know,” Mrs Hudson said.

“Oh Christ, are we loud?” John said. “I’m so sorry-”

“No, dear,” Mrs Hudson chuckled fondly. “Sherlock’s talked to me about it.”

“Right,” John sighed with relief. “He’s fine, though, right? I haven’t- he hasn’t said much to me. I mean, he seems alright and always check he’s fine with everything we do-"

“He’s fine,” Mrs Hudson said. “Just wanted to talk to someone.”

“And he feels he can’t talk to me?” John said, eyebrows drawn together anxiously.

“Sometimes you want an outsider’s perspective,” Mrs Hudson said. “It’s not a bad thing to be talking to other people. If you are worried, though, you need to talk to Sherlock.”

“Yeah,” John said. “Ta.”

 

Sherlock was in the middle of an experiment when John came back from Mrs Hudson’s. John knocked on the doorframe.

“Mmm?” Sherlock said.

“Sherlock,” John said. “I want to talk to you about sex.”

Sherlock sighed and rolled his eyes, but put down the flask of sheep urine he was holding and turned to face John.

“Yes?”

“I just- I know you’ve said the sex is fine,” John said awkwardly. “I just need to check that, well, that you prefer having it to not having it. Because we can stop, if you like.”

Sherlock removed his gloves and goggles, put them carefully down on the crowded table and walked over to John. He laid a hand on John’s shoulder with a sigh and stared down at him, making very pointed eye contact.

“It’s fine,” Sherlock said. “I don’t find it unpleasant. Our bodies respond quite positively to the sexual stimulation, I find."

John rolled his eyes. “Yes, thank you for that.” Sherlock smirked. “But you are... keen? Right?”

“I like feeling close to you,” Sherlock said with a shrug. “I like the feeling of belonging together that comes with it.”

“Good,” John said. “And you’ll tell me if something’s wrong?”

Sherlock rolled his eyes. “Yes. Stop worrying.”

Sherlock released John and resumed his experiment. John watched him and wondered if he would ever reach a point where he understood what was happening in his life. But the thought was just idle musing. In the end it didn’t matter what he told other people, for now it was enough that he was with Sherlock and they were content.


	15. Part 14

It was one of those impossibly strange things in life, but one Tuesday morning weeks after John had decided to simply be content with his life, things changed once more. There was nothing special about that particularly Tuesday morning, it was not long after a case had been solved and Sherlock had slept his sixteen hours catch up. He was amenable to John’s attempts at feeding him, but it was still a few hours before he would announce they could resume sexual practices and days or maybe weeks before he fell into a depressive slump if no further intellectual stimulation was provided. 

But it was on that Tuesday morning that John looked at Sherlock as he handed him a mug of tea and realised that he was achingly in love with the man. Sherlock looked at him curiously as John froze, taken aback by the realisation. John forced himself to smile naturally at Sherlock, say something teasingly about being glad that Sherlock was deigning to drink his tea, and then walk casually to the bathroom. 

He turned the sink tap on and splashed his face. The revelation was a bit unnerving. He was in love with Sherlock. Utterly besotted. Totally smitten. John Watson was barmy for Sherlock Holmes. When had this happened?

It hadn’t always been the case, John was sure of this. John had found Sherlock incredible when he first met him, and grown to love his friend the more he got to know him. He’d certainly never considered Sherlock like this when he’d received the Perfect Match notice, and he had no idea that things had begun to change by the time their application had been accepted and they sealed their lives together with vows and signatures. 

He did wonder briefly if the government had been right all along, or if Perfect Match was a self-fulfilling prophecy. It made him smile, but he dismissed the thought almost immediately. The government hadn’t been right, nor had they become a Perfect Match because they were treated like one. John may have fallen in love with Sherlock, but the reverse was certainly not true. It wasn’t that John doubted Sherlock cared for him or thought he wasn’t dedicated to spending the rest of his life with John, Sherlock simply had the good sense not to fall into this dreadful head over heels business. And it was a little bit dreadful. John’s heart felt constricted and the thought of going back out and having Sherlock look at him and know how he felt made John feel ill. 

John gave himself ten minutes to collect himself, using only three of those minutes to panic about the fact that he had fallen in love with Sherlock and the other seven to steel himself and think of how he was going to deal with the situation. 

The only answer was, of course, to carry on as if nothing had happened. And nothing had happened. Nothing had changed. John was now aware of his feelings towards his husband, but they weren’t new, and he had obviously been coping with them before, so he could again. Stiff upper lip, his suffering was nothing new to the world.

Suffering? That was a bit melodramatic. It was at worst a hardship. John would not allow himself to become mawkish about this. Loving someone was not a bad thing. Unrequited love stung, but it had its place. John could simply love Sherlock, not even having to settle with ‘from afar’, and continue on with his life.

 

“Why do you watch this dreck?” Sherlock demanded. 

“It’s interesting, relevant to our culture at the moment, gives me something to talk to patients about and it isn’t too demanding so I can use it to unwind after a long shift,” John said. They were sitting on the lounge, Sherlock’s feet in John’s lap and John wanted to tell Sherlock he loved his toes. Loved his whole foot in fact. His legs generally were, to John, very loveable. It was bit of a slippery slope so John kept his mouth shut and pulled the throw rug from the back of the couch over Sherlock’s feet so his toes didn’t get frostbite and fall off, which would rather upset John. Because he loved those toes. Christ, what was wrong with him?

“It’s moronic. It’s pandering to the lowest common denominator, clearly trying to upset people to get more votes and so make more money, the premise is hackneyed, the sets and costumes show the producers clearly have no interest in creating a quality programme and if Vanessa doesn’t get to the next round it will be criminal!” Sherlock said. “Chris is struggling to support a drug habit, Tonya is only after her fifteen minutes of fame, and don’t even get me started on Richard. The twins aren’t even his kids! Fetch me my phone!”

John had spent the week pointedly living life exactly as he had before and it had been rather tiring. Sherlock would say or do something so very... Sherlock and John would feel his heart ache with how much he loved the man. But then something would happen and they would share a smile, a laugh, a joke or even just a look and John just wanted Sherlock to be his. As much of Sherlock as John already had claim to, it didn’t feel like enough. It was enough to taunt John with the knowledge of what he was missing out on and not enough to provide relief. In these moments, John would have to remind himself that having Sherlock as a friend, as a husband, as something verging on a lover, as a colleague and as a partner was more than enough. He was spoiled with what he had.

And sometimes when they kissed it just felt perfect, like the world had decided to make sense, just for them, just for those few moments and he felt they were together, united, just as it should be. But at other times they would be kissing and John would be so painfully aware that pouring all of his adoration, his heart and his soul into Sherlock would simply leave him drained and pathetic, and Sherlock would be left with a shadow of a friend which would be terribly unfair. 

So he felt that he could be forgiven for responding to Sherlock’s complaining and ordering John about by stretching himself along the couch, using his arms to hold himself up as he positioned himself over Sherlock. For leaning down and kissing Sherlock deeply for a long few minutes. Because he was in love with this man and it was exhausting.

When they stopped for air, Sherlock looked at John curiously.

“Is everything okay?” Sherlock said. John laughed, finding the question funny coming from Sherlock. It was by no means the first time Sherlock had said that, but, John reflected it was the first time the reason for things not being entirely okay was because of Sherlock being so marvellous, rather than Sherlock having left colons in the kitchen sink.

“I think it will be better if you go back to kissing me,” John said with a lascivious grin.

“I can probably manage that,” Sherlock said, pulling John’s head down and lifting his own hips to rub against John.

 

John looked down at Sherlock’s messy hair, smoothed it back, pleased when Sherlock curled himself further into John’s body. Unusually, Sherlock had been the one to fall asleep after sex and John was luxuriating in the moment. If he had to be in love with the man, it seemed only fair that he could enjoy it when these moments presented themselves. Sherlock was warm and pliant in his arms, but also sound asleep so John didn’t have to worry about keeping his feelings hidden. He could simply run his eyes lovingly over Sherlock’s naked form and let his heart swell with love. Sherlock was doing a pretty convincing job of looking like he was sound asleep, so John traced softly over Sherlock’s ribs, his hipbones, up and down his sternum, across his collar bone, dipping his head down occasionally to kiss Sherlock very softly. God it hurt.


	16. Part 15

Things had certainly reached a sad state of affairs on Friday afternoon, when ten days after John realised he was in love with Sherlock, John found himself complaining to Mycroft Holmes of all people.

Mycroft had been surprised to see John turn up at the Diogenes Club, if the slight twitch of his left nostril had been any indication, but didn’t comment as he took him through to a room where they could talk. He gestured for John to sit and rang for tea.

“To what do I owe this pleasure, Doctor Watson?” Mycroft asked, sounding rather disinterested, which John knew meant he had managed to flummox him and pique his curiosity.

“I was in the neighbourhood, can’t a man visit his brother-in-law?” John said, hoping to get a rise.

“Of course,” Mycroft said. They stared quietly at each other, ignoring the staff member who served them tea, Mycroft looking calm and serene, and John wryly amused and indulgent.

But John had come because he felt like he was at the end of his tether. Unable to withstand the emotional roller coaster he seemed to have boarded by mistake. And conceding first would make Mycroft smug and pleased, and much more willing to condescend to help John.

“Your brother is a difficult man to love,” John said.

“Many people have made a similar observation,” Mycroft said mildly. “But they usually mean the idea of him being loveable is challenging, rather than the act of doing so. Which do you fall into?”

John raised an eyebrow at Mycroft and to his surprise Mycroft laughed.

“Very well, John, we’ll not play games today,” Mycroft said. “To love Sherlock is almost always deeply demanding and only occasionally richly rewarding. I am tied to him through family; you through marriage and for better or worse we have decided to respect these ties and try to do our best by him.”

“You by being an interfering git and me by tending to his emotional and physical needs and providing him with love, support, affection and loyalty?” John asked. 

Mycroft inclined his head. “If you wish to see it that way. As I said, we do what we can for him. In this instance, I fear you can no longer perform effectively in this role while you remain so close to him.”

“You want me to leave him?” John asked, surprised. “That’s not going to happen.”

“Not permanently,” Mycroft said. “That would suit neither of our agendas.”

“I don’t have an agenda,” John said firmly. “Not everything everyone does has ulterior motives.”

“I merely meant that you wish to neither hurt him nor abandon him,” Mycroft said. “But staying with him now will only worsen your affliction, which in turn will make the situation harder to navigate with a clear head.”

“And you think leaving is the answer?” John said.

“Not leaving, simply separating yourself for a short while,” Myrcroft said. “You’re currently too close to the situation, you need to make sure your priorities are clear, your impulses and reactions guided by logic and reason, not imprecise and unpredictable emotions. Time spent in reflection away from Sherlock could assist help you to achieve greater control over your emotions, and also allow you to consider the likely long term scenarios for your union and plan accordingly.”

“You do know you sound a bit like a robot?” John said.

“I believe others have thought similarly, but knew better than to voice such an opinion,” Mycroft said coolly. John rolled his eyes.

“Of course they did,” John said.

 

John thought long and hard about what Mycroft said as he headed back to 221b. The coldly detached plan Mycroft had suggested made sense once he managed to translate from emotionless sod back into human. As long as John was around Sherlock, he was going to be too busy being smitten to deal with the realities of their situation. Some time away would let him clear his head and consider, objectively, what he needed to do about their situation. How to best handle things so they both could be happy. He had to be thinking about the next fifty years, not just the here and now.

Sherlock was in the kitchen and John smiled at him as he went into their bedroom. The thought of being away from him hurt a little bit, which was probably a sign that a break really was needed. It boded poorly for a relationship if one person was entirely self-sufficient and the other got a bit sad over going away for more than a few days. He pulled some basic supplies into a small bag and then went to talk to Sherlock in the kitchen.

“Look, Sherlock, I think I’m going to go stay with Harry for a bit. Just while I sort some things out,” John said. Sherlock looked over John, studying him. John had tried to sound casual, not wanting to alarm Sherlock or make a big deal out of it, but apparently he failed miserably at this.

“What’s wrong?” Sherlock demanded. “I don’t see what the problem is. Thing have been good. You’ve been happy.”

Sherlock looked so earnest and confused and more than a little hurt. Something deep in John twisted at the sight of it. A dozen excuses and conciliatory phrases crossed John’s mind, but they all felt hollow and dishonest. And even if he had learned nothing else in their months of marriage, John knew that they could get nowhere if he left things in a state of confusion.

“I love you,” John said quietly. “I’ve only gone and fallen in love with you.”

“So? That sounds like a positive thing, marriage wise,” Sherlock said, baffled.

“Not when it’s one sided,” John said.

“I’ve loved you for a long time!” Sherlock protested.

“As a friend, Sherlock,” John said. 

“Yes,” Sherlock said. “No.” He ran his hands through his hair in frustration. “What’s the difference? What does it matter?”

“It matters, Sherlock!” John said. Sherlock groaned and marched over to John, pulling the duffel bag away from him. He wrapped his hands around John’s face and kissed him, thoroughly, hungrily, desperately. John stood still and pliant in his hold. Sherlock let out a small whimper and John slipped his hands around Sherlock’s waist and turned the kiss into something softer, gentler, deeply affectionate, but a transition, easing them out of the kiss. John stepped carefully back, out of reach.

“Sherlock,” John said despairingly. “I don’t understand what’s happening here. You kiss me, we have sex and I just don’t know if it’s because you don’t want to lose me or if it’s because you want me.”

“You’re not making sense!” Sherlock said. “You just said the same thing twice, as though it means something different!”

“It does,” John said, his voice low and harsh. “It means something profoundly different. Tell me, Sherlock, why did you kiss me?”

There was a pause, thick with tension, before Sherlock turned slightly away and spoke in a low voice,

“I look at you sometimes, and that’s all I want to do,” Sherlock said. “It’s terribly inconvenient at crime scenes, and it distracts me, but then you’ll look at me and smile or cock your head or say I’m amazing and it’s not that I don’t want to kiss you anymore, because I do, but the urgency is gone. I’m just happy to have you near.”

John’s face crumpled. Sherlock looked broken. There was a moment of total silence. Total stillness. It was as if time had stopped in 221b, and in a sense, it was as if their lives had stopped. Unsure of which way they were about to turn. Then John took a deep breath and stepped forward cautiously. He reached out a hand and ran a finger along Sherlock’s cheekbone before burying it in Sherlock’s hair. As he pulled the detective’s face closer to his and reached up to press their lips together once more, he remembered sitting in Mrs Hudson’s lounge room, all those months ago and trying to imagine doing this and failing because he thought it required lust and all he had was fondness and he had assumed that would never be enough. But as their lips met and Sherlock sagged in relief, John knew his love for this man was based on those feelings of wonder, excitement and that peculiar sense of home. The desire had come later, true, but it didn’t create the love, it couldn’t grow this absurd adoration. 

“I love you,” John whispered when they broke apart. “I’m sorry for not seeing you felt the same.”

“I can hardly blame you,” Sherlock said with wry self-deprecation, “When I failed to realise it myself.”

John chuckled and kissed Sherlock lightly again, just a quick brush of lips. 

“Don’t feel too bad, it’s easy enough to do,” John said.


	17. Part 16

The usual fade to black, credits roll, happily-ever-after that followed the declarations of love and fidelity in stories, John reflected, was oddly accurate in some ways. Even though something absurdly enormous had changed in their lives, somehow everything managed to continue on as it had before. They solved cases, Sherlock managed to upset everyone in a five mile radius, John painstakingly typed out blog posts. There were experiments and take out, shifts at the clinic and arguments over body parts in the fridge, not to mention rather a lot of fantastic sex. But as much as everything stayed the same, everything felt different. Like their lives had just been shifted on an axis, same physical location but a wholly new perspective. 

John was happy. John was absurdly happy. John was absurdly happy at the most inappropriate times. Sherlock might be shouting at dog walkers in the park, and John would find himself terribly appreciative of just how scathing Sherlock could be, how loud he could make his displeasure, how inane his complaints. And then Sherlock would come back to John and continue his diatribe in a low growl, so John would have to kiss him and just when he thought he could love the man no more, Sherlock’s face would twist as his desire to be pleased warred with his desire to stay cranky. 

They still fought, of course. Being in love did not mean Sherlock had stopped using John’s mugs for experiments or playing his violin at all hours of the night. Nor did it make Sherlock any less annoyed when John upset his sock index or spilled tea over one of the endless piles of papers Sherlock left all over the flat.

Their newfound state of happiness also did not mean that Sherlock had stopped getting bored. John liked to think that the fits of depression had lessoned over time, from when John had first agreed to be Sherlock’s flatmate, steadily decreasing in frequency and intensity, but they had been so busy the last few months it was hard to tell if they had stopped altogether in light of their changed relationship or if indeed they ever would. The sulky boredom, however, John had simply accepted as part of their lives together.

 

Lestrade dropped in to see them during one of these stroppy moods. John had greeted him cheerfully, ignoring Sherlock’s complaints that Lestrade wasn’t bringing him a serial killer, and made them tea, asking Lestrade how he’d been, how work was going and so forth. When conversation reached a natural pause, Lestrade admitted that he had come with a case for Sherlock.

“Dull!” Sherlock declared after flipping through the file.

“Look, your brother asked for me to look into it,” Lestrade said. “Which makes me think there must be something more to the case than a simple homicide gone wrong. And it’s probably pretty important if it’s caught Mycroft’s attention.”

“My brother?” Sherlock said, sitting up properly to scrutinise Lestrade. “Since when have you been talking to Mycroft? Since when are you on first name terms with Mycroft? Who said you could talk to that slimy git?”

“I didn’t know I needed your permission,” Lestrade said, sounding amused.

“Mycroft and Sherlock are of course feuding,” John said. “Everyone has to pick sides and disloyalty is punishable by death. I was granted rights to talk to both when I married Sherlock, but usually to get that sort of immunity takes months of careful negotiation.”

“I can see my mistake now,” Lestrade said with a laugh. “Do you think if I found a locked room murder he might be lenient?”

“You’re not funny,” Sherlock said. “I already said I’m not interested in the case, why are you still here?”

“I wanted to ask for some advice, actually,” Lestrade said. “About Mycroft.”

“No,” Sherlock said.

“Sherlock,” John said warningly. “Go ahead, ignore him. He’s in insufferable git mode today. Not that you can really tell the difference.”

Sherlock threw a pillow at John.

“I think Mycroft’s wife is cheating on him,” Lestrade said awkwardly. “And I’m not sure if I should tell him or not. Sometimes I think it would be better to just not know, but that sort of scandal can ruin a man’s career.”

“The only cheating in that marriage is between Mycroft and a black forest mud cake,” Sherlock said. “I highly doubt Anthea is sleeping with anyone during billable hours.”

“During what?” Lestrade said, eyebrows shooting up.

“As far as we can work out, Mycroft married Anthea when he reached a point that he couldn’t really be not married and still be considered respectable,” John said. “Anthea presumably receives some enormous wage to present as Mycroft’s wife when needs be, and otherwise lives her life quite discretely.”

“As far as we can work out?” Sherlock scoffed. “It’s hardly some great mystery. I saw the contract, I had to sign a statement of non-disclosure and that sort of rubbish.”

“They have a contract?” Lestrade said, sounding faintly ill.

Sherlock rolled his eyes. “It’s not a sex thing.”

Lestrade nodded. “It’s still a bit weird though, right?”

“I have long since given up on the hope that my brother will act in ways that are comprehensible to others,” Sherlock said.

John smothered a giggle, but Lestrade let out a huff of incredulous laughter. Sherlock glared at them.

“So what will Mycroft do if Anthea falls in love with someone?” Lestrade asked.

“I imagine he’ll find them some sort of employment that would allow them close contact,” Sherlock said.

“And if Mycroft fell in love?” Lestrade said.

Sherlock wrinkled his nose. “That hardly seems likely.”

John looked at Lestrade curiously before saying, “Holmes brothers, in my experience, can be curiously ignorant in matters of the heart.”

Sherlock frowned at him and when John caught it, he smiled softly. “But that doesn’t mean they can’t learn. They are astute students.”

Sherlock settled back down on the lounge looking appeased. Lestrade looked between them in shock.

“Are you two-?” Lestrade said.

“I am the Holmes brother to whom John is referring, obviously,” Sherlock said.

“Good for you, mate,” Lestrade said, leaning over to clap John on the shoulder. Sherlock sighed discontentedly on the lounge.

“He’s pleased by the state of affairs, as you can tell,” John said with a grin. Lestrade laughed. Sherlock made a grumbling noise, but then he sat up sharply and looked at Lestrade.

“Would you leave if I said I wanted to have sex with John?” Sherlock said.

“Sherlock!” John said, feeling his cheeks heat. Lestrade looked greatly amused.

 

Sherlock’s boredom was broken eventually, as John knew it would be. Not by Lestrade’s case of course, Sherlock refused to get involved with it, but they had a private client who offered a delightfully bizarre mystery that concluded with a thrilling chase through a tube train. Once that was all sorted, they decided to spend the day enjoying London, Sherlock impressing John with his knowledge of murder sights and obscure speciality shops. 

When they came back to 221, Sherlock was in an exuberantly good mood and insisted they call on Mrs Hudson. 

“Good afternoon, Mrs Hudson!” Sherlock said. “I require tea and chocolate biscuits.”

“Don’t mind him,” John said. “How’s the hip?”

“Oh it’s been playing up all morning,” Mrs Hudson said cheerfully. “Come in, I’ll put the kettle on, and I think I have a packet left. You two look like you’ve had a good day. What’s made you so happy Sherlock? It’s not another serial killer, is it?”

“I just solved a magnificent case, we spent the day in London, I have a John Watson by my side and a Mrs Hudson with chocolate biscuits to come home to,” Sherlock said. “Why wouldn’t I be happy?”

Sherlock laughed and kissed her on the cheek.

“Well that’s lovely, dear.” Mr Hudson said. “Does this mean you’ll stop shooting my walls?”

 

As they were leaving Mrs Hudson’s, John spotted a pale green envelope sitting with the rest of the mail. 

“Christ, what now?” John said. Sherlock followed his gaze and groaned. John grabbed the envelope and opened it. There were a few official looking sheets of paper and John read through them rapidly, uncomprehendingly. They were divorce papers. For him and Sherlock. Everything filled out except, it seemed, for the two spaces where there signatures would go.

“What is it?” Sherlock asked, and John wordlessly handed him the papers.


	18. Part 17

John looked at the letter and then at Sherlock. “I didn’t, did you?”

Sherlock shook his head sharply. “No,” he said. “Mycroft.”

The word was said without the usual distaste and derision. Sherlock sounded wondering, almost amazed.

“Mycroft?” John said. “Why would he do this? He had time to stop things before we got married, has had months to say something to us. Why now?”

“I don’t know,” Sherlock said. He was so flabbergasted, he didn’t even sound annoyed at himself for this lack of knowledge of his brother’s psyche.

“What do we do with it?” John said.

“Mycroft could have easily forged our signatures, so I suspect the idea is it’s up to us if we want to use it or not,” Sherlock said.

“Do you- you don’t want to divorce, do you?” John said.

Sherlock thought about it for a moment. “Staying married certainly seems more convenient.”

“You’re such a romantic, you know that?” John said dryly.

“I only meant that it doesn’t much matter one way or another if we’re married or not,” Sherlock said. “I still intend on continuing this relationship in a similar manner, and you seem fairly dedicated to doing the same. Being married offers us a lot of advantages and divorce carries a lot of stigma. So, staying married seems more convenient.”

“Right,” John said. Sherlock looked at him.

“You don’t want a divorce,” he said, just a hint of doubt in his voice.

“Of course not,” John said. “I love you, you berk.”

“Well, yes,” Sherlock said, looking aloof, but sounding pleased. “And I, you. But we didn’t get married for sentimental reasons.”

“No, but it still changed us, affected us emotionally,” John said. “Don’t you think divorce would do the same?”

“Perhaps,” Sherlock said. “But it’s not worth speculating on, we seem to be in agreement that we will stay married.”

“So what do we do with those?” John said. Sherlock pulled a pained face.

“We talk to Mycroft.”

 

Mycroft met them in his private room at the Diogenes Club. He seemed utterly unsurprised by the sight of the two of them storming in.

“I see you received the divorce papers?” Mycroft observed coolly.

“I don’t understand,” John said. “You seemed so desperate to have us get married, why would you want to undo it now? You did it to help Sherlock, I might not have liked it but I could understand it. But this? It’s actually worse for Sherlock to be divorced than single, so not only will your scheme have failed to protect Sherlock, it will have made this much harder for him.”

“It has come to my attention recently that marriage cannot simply be a socio-economic transaction,” Mycroft said. “Marriage is too closely tied up with love and affection, and I have no power over matters of the heart.”

“But Sherlock and I love each other, why would we need to get a divorce?” John said.

“You were married under the wrong conditions,” Mycroft said. 

“Your conditions,” Sherlock spat. “Why the change of heart now? Gone off the idea of my being married? I do wish you would keep me informed of these little whims you get; they really are most inconvenient.”

“You do not have to get divorced, I merely wished to provide you with that recourse,” Mycroft said.

“You don’t trust us?” John said at the same time Sherlock said, “You find it that hard to believe that I could have found love?”

Mycroft looked carefully between them. “No. This is not about you. This is about the role the government plays in marriage in this country. Your choice when it came to getting married was taken away from you, I simply want to give it back.”

Sherlock relaxed and nodded. “Fine. We have decided to stay married.”

He thrust the papers at Myrcoft who took them calmly and placed them neatly on a small table. Sherlock leaned over and tipped Mycroft’s cup of tea over them and Mycroft rolled his eyes. John ignored them, thinking hard about what Mycroft had said.

“How on earth did our marriage make you question the system?” John said. “Surely, if anything, it proved it works?”

“Once again, I emphasise, this is not about you. You are but two people among many. Though you may have managed to achieve contentment and stability within a marriage formed under duress, not everyone can be so lucky,” Mycroft said. “And unfortunately the system surrounding Perfect Match marriages is not the worst of it. The whole system encourages people to get married young to people they do not know. It ostracises those who seek love based on emotion rather than reason and those who wish to escape unhappy marriages. The system creates more problems than it seeks to solve.”

John blinked at him. “There’s problems, Christ knows that’s true. I’ve experienced some of them myself, and witnessed plenty of others. But they’re problems of individuals, people who seek to take advantage or manipulate things, people who aren’t committed, or just the inevitable problems that come from living in a flawed world. But on the whole, it works, doesn’t it?”

“That’s what the statistics report,” Mycroft said. “But of course it’s easy to report that divorce rates are down when attaining a divorce is both legally difficult and culturally unacceptable.”

“The government lies to us, what a shock,” John said dryly. “Christ, I can’t believe I’m saying this, but I do agree with you. The system has become absurdly complicated, and good ideas have degraded into useless and sometimes hurtful practices. But it just needs to be reviewed, cleaned up a bit. It works, people are living longer and we’re wealthier and happier and more stable.”

“Happier?” Mycroft said. “How is that measured, I wonder?”

John was starting to get confused and frustrated. “Marriage is a good thing.”

“I do not disagree,” Mycroft said.

“And as an institution it needs to be regulated,” John said. “There needs to be rules and customs or it will fall apart.”

“True,” Mycroft said.

“You want to get rid of Matching,” John said slowly, sounding rather awed.

“I did not say that,” Mycroft said, the corner of his mouth twitching upwards.

“No, well you wouldn’t,” John said. “Minor government officials never do.”

“Quite,” Mycroft agreed.

“That’s not the whole story,” Sherlock said. “You’ve known about the systems flaws for ages. Something’s changed, something’s made you reevaluate your opinion on the system. John’s right, it can’t have been us. Or not just us.”

Sherlock studied Mycroft carefully, thinking hard. Then he stopped and grabbed John’s arm. 

“Let’s go.”

“What? Why?” John said.

“Mycroft’s apparently experienced love,” Sherlock said. “And the last thing I want to do is sit here listening to him moon about it.”

 

“Do you think he can do it?” John asked, when they got home. “Do you think he should?”

Sherlock thought for a moment.

“I don’t know,” he said finally. “The only things I’ve ever cared to know about the system related to murders and other crimes.”

“Do you think we would have fallen in love if it wasn’t for this?” John said

“Who knows?” Sherlock said with a shrug. “If we hadn’t gone through this experience, we would have gone through another, and it would have changed us in different ways. Whether it brought us closer or drove us apart or stabilised what we had or something else entirely... There’s just too many different elements to predict, and one must never theorise without all of the facts.”

“Yeah,” John said. “But doesn’t it make you wonder? About Mrs Hudson and Harry and Lestrade and all those other people we see get hurt by marriage?”

“Nothing can ever be fully blamed on a system,” Sherlock said decisively. “We still have free will and make choices.”

“That’s true,” John said. He reached up and cupped Sherlock’s cheek, leaning in to kiss him softly. “Maybe we would never have married, but I can’t imagine I would ever not have loved you. As a friend, a partner, a colleague, whatever we were, I like to think I would have been there to help you and love you and understand you and go out into the world with you. I think my choices would always lead me to your side.”


End file.
